Austrian mom

Probably the third Austrian that has ever given me ride, really neat mom with a kid in the back. She used to live in France and Spain, so we had a good conversation about traveling. She got really jealous about my summer plans :D Said she always picks up hitchhikers, despite her husband telling her not to. (#feminism :P) Drove me to fairly desperate spot (I misunderstood which… (read on in Trip)

Czech waitress in Austria

Young Czech girl from Mikulov, who worked in Austria as a waitress. Picked me up from a pretty hopeless on-ramp.

First Lithuanian ever

Lithuanian trucker who I talked to at the border crossing between A and CZ. Spoke some Russian and some English, so we switched between the two. It was the first time I actually interacted with a Lithuanian person, let alone getting a ride. Drove me to Brno.

Hostelier

Neat Czech guy who used to hitch himself and who was quite well traveled. Now opening a hostel in Mikulov, so I'll definitely pay them a visit in the future :)

Tunisian-Polish trucker!

Really awesome ride. Tunisian trucker in a Polish truck. He'd lived in Poland with his Polish wife for 7 years. We had a great conversation in Polish (his was great, unlike my kindergardener Arabic, which I tried, too) just about everything from the Arab Spring, the Amazigh to farming in Poland to how his dad drives trucks from Tunisia to Mauritania via the Sahara (my heart… (read on in Trip)

Weirdest ride ever, ended up in a tow truck

Relatively uneventful start, hitched at a spot which wasn't that great last time, but this time almost immediately an Austrian guy stopped. The guy was going back to Vienna however, so I declined. Shortly afterwards a Czech guy with a Moravian license plate pulled over and was going directly to Brno, which was awesome. Literally 2 minutes into the ride the car started making… (read on in Trip)

Same guy, same time

I was hitching at my favorite gas station in Brno. The guy who picked me up last time and drove me all the way to Vienna told me that he drives the same truck at the same time every single day at 5.30. Well this time he was late, but happily picked me up 5.55 :P We talked a bit about cars and stuff.

Polish guy from Bochnia

Cool Polish guy from Bochnia (a really random place I've actually been to by complete accident). He worked in Austria and was a building janitor. We had a great conversation about how dealing with people is difficult as we both have or had jobs, which entailed it. Sometimes people just vent their frustration at you, which is something we both understood really well. The ride… (read on in Trip)

Moravian Trucker

Nice guy who does daily deliveries to Vienna. We talked about our lives and how he's been delivering to the same Austrian company for the past 30 years. I really liked his Moravian accent. Offered to take me to Vienna anytime I feel like it, as he pretty much always departs from the same spot at the same time.

My heart skipped a beat when I saw a Slovak license plate. It was two Slovak Hungarians going home from Italy in a van and although they werent going far, it was in the right direction and past a highway junction. While waiting for them to refill and a random Slovenian pulled up and asked if I needed a ride, owning up to Slovenias good hh reputation.

Two Slovenian women

Two Slovenian women who I talked to in my broken Serbian. Didnt hesitate much. Fairly quiet ride, but later asked if I spoke English and we talked for a bit. Took me to Maribor.

Austrian youth soccer team

Talked to these guys at a gas station in Slovenia and they were going all the way to Vienna in a bunch of vans, which was awesome. They were returning from some soccer turnament in Croatia, where theyd lost. Didnt talk much, their accent was almost incomprehensible for my petite Hochdeutsch ears. Dropped me off at a pretty deserted gas station before Vienna.

Italian guy with a Czech wife

Asked this guy in an Italian van, not giving it much of a chance. However, it turned out the guy had a Czech wife back in Italy and was going to Olomouc! He was delivering marble panels to some posh apartment all the way in Stockholm! We had a great conversation and talked about how hes installed these marble panels his entire life and how he worked in Prague in the early 90s… (read on in Trip)

Polish guy

Polish guy who I talked to at my favorite gas station in Brno. He was going to some village near Vienna, but considering my previous experience with gas stations on the Brno-Vienna autobahn, I decided to get out at the border and hitch there. The guy worked as maintenace for cell towers, which I found fascinating, so we had a really interesting conversation about it. He… (read on in Trip)

Awesome Ukrainian trucker

Getting of at the Austrian border really paid off, as a Polish truck pulled over fairly quickly thanks to my "Graz" sign. He was going all the way there, so this was a perfect ride, getting me past the nightmare of Vienna. The trucker was Ukrainian and we had a great conversation in Russian. He used to be a smuggler between Ukraine and the rebel held territories, which he said… (read on in Trip)

Austrian guy

Austrian guy driving an old "handicapped transport" van. Talked to him after a fairly long wait at a gas statio, which I though was great originally. Although it was a bit difficult to understand his German, we still had a good conversation about how Flixbus fucked me over (the one time I didnt hitchhike and took a bus to catch a flight and guess what, the guy takes off with… (read on in Trip)

Entrepreneur from Brno

I was quite happy to see a Czech license plate at a gas station, which seemed a bit dead. The guy actually departed from Brno a couple of hours later than I did and was actually going all the way to Ljubljana! We had a really interesting conversation about his business (he owned a clothing company) and it was so exciting to listen to someone with so much experience. We talked… (read on in Trip)

Postal truck

I was waiting at a terrible spot (found a much better one later on), but a truck quickly pulled over. The guy was delivering mail to a distribution center, which is fairly unusual (theyre usually not allowed to pick up hhkers). They guy was quite sarcastic, but fun. Drove me to a pretty good spot.

Guy from Brno collecting water in the reservoir

Really nice guy who regularly drives back and forth between the reservoirs on the Austrian border to collect water to drink in Brno. Went out of his way to get me as far as possible towards the border.

Belarussian trucker

Nice Belarussian trucker in a Polish truck. We talked in Russian about Belarus, Poland and stuff. Drove me to a pretty bad gas station right in front of Vienna.

Terrible spot - awesome ride

After an hour of abosutely no one going towards Vienna and trying to get the hell out of the gas station/autobahn, I gave up and went back to the gas station. While still walking on the on-ramp a car approached and I tried to hitch it. It was a mom with her kids going to a mall south of Vienna. They were really nice and we had a nice conversation about hitching and how she had Czech ancestry.

Retired soldier

Nice older guy who talked a lot about the history of Kaliningrad and pointed out nice old German buildings along the way. Also pointed out a military base, which we passed by and which was insanely secured (signaling strips, armed soldiers, razor wire fences, electric wire…). In the end he went out of his way to get me to the border crossing. He showed me his military ID as… (read on in Trip)

Insane Polish (ex)smuggler

Guy in a small Polish truck, who was going to Russia pretty much just to get cheaper gas. The crossing took a while because it was a Polish border obviously… We talked about everything and the guy kept mentioning that he used to work with the customs agents, which I didnt quite understand. Once we finally got to the Polish checkpoint, he was directed into the xray (for… (read on in Trip)

Russian marshrutka for free

I was all fresh after spending a perfect night in my tent on a sand dune overlooking the sea – it was a national park, so probably illegal AF… Walked through the forest back to the main road and after a fairly short wait a van pulled over and was going all the way to Kaliningrad, which was perfect, as I need to get all the way to Gdansk that way. It turned out to be a… (read on in Trip)

Russian couple

A nice Russian couple going all the way to Kaliningrad, who turned around to take me as they saw my "Rus" sign. They had their own car repair business and went shopping in Poland. We talked a bit about our countries and enjoyed a fairly reasonable wait at the border – while waiting, we met a bunch of Russian bikers and you could just see the joy and excitement in the drivers… (read on in Trip)

Family

Nice family, who was on a vacation up north and took me to Malbork.

Interesting guy

Interesting guy from Katowice, who worked in Krakow. Had a good conversation about corpo life and how he started to work for IBM back in the day. He some really interesting anecdotes and I really enjoyed talking to him.

Russian guys!

My heart skipped a beat when a Russian license plate pulled over, thinking they might be headed all the way to Kaliningrad, which would have been an awesome hitch from the outskirts of Katowice. They were not, but still pretty awesome. The guys were returning from a festival in Budapest to Moscow via Belarus and were headed to Czestochowa for the night. I really liked being… (read on in Trip)

Most amazing Polish pair

A Polish pair, who was just returning from helping out refugees in Serbia (or was it Greece?). He had a fanastic conversation and they were also hosting on CS. Offered me a place to stay as it was already dark at that point. but I wanted to get as far north on the autostrada as possible, so I declined and chose to get off at a gas station instead. The girl studied in China,… (read on in Trip)

Short wait at a gas station

After a day full of awesome rides, I was ready to get to Gdansk that night (which is crazy considering I'd started hitching after work, so at around 5pm). Asked pretty much like two people and the third said yes (also a bit hesitantly). It was a family traveling in two cars and towing another one. Didn't talk much, but were driving all the way to Gdansk! Nevertheless, their… (read on in Trip)

The first time I hitched a bus

So I was with a Polish couple, who I met earlier at Timna Park and we were going back to Eilat. This bus stopped (we were at a bus stop) and guy was on the phone. I approached thinking he stopped for us, which he didn't (he stopped to talk on the phone). We told him we were going to Eilat, so he decided to take us for free, as he was returning from a trip. Didn't speak much… (read on in Trip)

Ride to town with an accidental hhiker

I was going to probably take a bus, but decided to hitch anyway and pretty soon a cute Israeli girl pulled over. There was another girl at the stop who also asked if she could join and we both got a ride to Eilat from the border.

Airport security guard

The guy was a security guard at the new Eilat airport – he was one of the famous (or rather infamous) interviewers (or rather interrogators?), but he was nice and we talked a bit about his job. He d just flown in from Tel Aviv and was on his way to the construction site of the new airport.

Two German girls and hitching with a Polish couple

I finally got to Timna park, but unfortunately they didnt have bikes to rent out at the entrance. I was with a Polish couple, who Id met shortly before, so we decided to hitch to the last station and borrow the bikes there. Two German girls took us, but it was a fairly short ride.