The 1000 Day Holiday

I headed for Ukiah, CA where I was meeting Alex, a fellow CS’er whos road tripping around Oregon and Washington.

Packed and out the door, I’m totally looking forward to hitch hiking again. The last time was in South Africa in 2006!

RIDE 1 It took me 45 mins to get a ride offer at the on ramp to the Golden Gate Bridge. I didn’t realise the town he mentioned was not far over the bridge. But I was still glad to get off the mark.

He dropped me at a really nasty on ramp in Marin County. This is where all the affluent grandmas and their BMW’s live just north of the bridge. A bad bad place to hitch from.

45 Minutes, and I’m getting a little hot. 2 asian ladys stop in the middle of the on ramp to ask me where I’m going, almost causing an accident. Their English isn’t very good so I cant get much out of them about where they would drop me. So I decide to stay at the worlds worst hitching spot.

RIDE 1.a 60 minutes to the second and the guy who dropped me off pulls up and says he realised he dropped me in a really bad spot and he’ll take me further up the highway.

40 Miles later! He drops me at the Santa Rosa junction. We were having a great chat about kitesurfing & he was procrastinating on the other things he was supposed to do.

45 Mins waiting in the beating sun….

RIDE 2 A woman pulls up and offers me a ride to Windsor, its only 12 miles up the highway but its still on route, so I jump in. Quickly into conversation about her hitching trips across the states, she mentions shes on her way to Walmart for some clothing. Then checks the time and says Ukiah will have a bigger one so she’ll drive me all the way. An extra 120 Miles to her intended trip!

She drops me off at the corner where Alex’s house is supposed to be. But I cant find it. 3990 to the right, 4011 to the left. I spot a guy coming out of his garage, so approach up the driveway to ask if he knows… He comes out towards me and says

“I dont wan none of what youre selling, get outa ere”

“go on, get”

I explain I’m not selling anything, and that I’m looking for house #4001. He has no idea (hes 4020), So I walk back around the corner. In this process a F350 truck stops in the middle of the road, backs up to me and the guy leans out the window and asks me what I’m looking for with a lot of suspicion.

I say I’m looking for 4001, its not up there, its not back there, so it must be down this side street.

He looks at me and says “its not up there, thats my neighbour the browns.”

I walk up there anyway and find his house. next to the Browns

It turns out Alex’s place is in an area the locals call Oakey Flats. As in full of Oakland immigrants (‘rednecks’), and Ukiah is in the Green triangle of Northern California where all the marijuana is grown…

So all in all a strange but great day hitching. And after this story about greyhound, and my experience last year I had no desire to get back on a greyhound bus.

Well I managed it. Hitched all the way from Windhoek to Capetown. No problems apart from being dropped off in random places like Grünau ( a shell petrol station 150km from the border) in the dark.

The first truck driver taught me about underground rivers and how to find them in the desert, and how to tell how deep they are by the trees growing there.

After a 3 or 4 hour wait in the middle of the desert at the major intersection. Finally a truck was going the right way and I scored a ride.

The second one we listened to Gospel Music cd’s for around 500km at full volume. One song on repeat for a good hundred clicks or so. So dont worry, “The devil will do me no harm”

He had said he was going to Capetown, awesome. Ended up dropping me off at the turnoff to Picketburg around 9pm… a quaint small city around 120km from Capetown.

So I walked up the road, hoping to spot a B&B, hotel, motel anything. I wasn’t having much luck. And there was no one on the streets. I saw a woman in an Audi pull up to a workshop and check the doors were locked. I called out to her, but I think she ignored me.

She drove past me really slowly, stopped and asked if I needed a place to stay. There was a guesthouse next to her home! score…

This morning I was asking the GH owner about bus/shuttle options into Cape Town as everyone says to avoid the suburbs at your lifes cost. There was one bus at 1pm. But didnt want to wait that long. She said the shuttles were for coloureds.

Anyway none of those were going either. So I hitched again. The woman from guesthouse really didn’t believe I was serious about hitching and was saying she would give me a ride to the bus.

In the end she dropped me off on the highway with a can of juice and wished me luck. She said she would check later to make sure I was gone. Bummer that she dropped me at a different intersection. 100km zone, very small shoulder with the road coming around a long sweeping bend. I wasn’t hopeful.

15 Minutes later a car pulled up.  The hubcaps still spinning when the car had stopped. COOL! The boot was welded shut (quality mazda 323!), so jammed my bag in and off we went. The wife was telling me its a great day as this is the first time her husband has been able to drive in 6 months as he had a car accident and just got the all clear from the doctor. Then proceeded to point out where the accident happened.. ARGH.  

They dropped me off at an offramp 60km out from Capetown. I crossed to the onramp and started the wait. After 20 minutes of no luck a corporate painted Toyota Hilux turns the corner, defininately not the type to pick up a hitcher. I saw him look, then a second of thought then pulled over and backed up!

He said he never picks up hitchhikers but I didn’t look like a normal hitcher, and I would probably have some funny stories. Dropped me right in Cape Town!

Well that was 2 different trucks that I hitch hiked on in Botswana.

The first truck driver spotted me on the Zambian side of the border and told me to find him on the other side. Hanging out waiting for his papers to be completed turned into 4 hours. And then he couldn’t find the last page of the paperwork.

During this time he had explained the noises coming from under his bed. He was smuggling birds from the Congo. In the end he was stuck at the border, and I cut my losses around 4pm.

The driver of the next truck to pick me up was downing the beers. Didnt seem to matter too much as it was a 300km straight road, Although once it was dark we did fly past a elephant seriously close to the road.. hmm.

ended up stuck at a vet/foot n mouth control point in the middle of the desert as the trucks arent allowed to drive after 6pm. So it looked like i was spending the night in the open.

The police on the post took an interest in me, told me to sit with them and have a chat and they’ll sort a ride out for me. All the other hitch hikers booted off the trucks were swamping the few cars coming thru the checkpoint.

After an hour or so a very flash and new looking car pulled up to the check point. The cops said this would be my ride so grab my bags. It turned out to be a government car. He took me to the town of Nata 50km away where the N-S & W-E roads meet. A town comprising of gas stations w attached bottleshops and diners.

He even arranged a motel for me. Told me to lock the door, and watch the satellite TV. Turned out that the satellite TV was only the 7 free to air GOD channels.

Then on the way from Maun to Windhoek I had the pleasure of Rod Stewart, Whitney houston love ballads. It was good tho, as I covered 800km in ~10 hours. Fastest ever

Hitchhiking is king. Payment is expected tho. The going rate is a crazy $1/100km… A real bank breaker.