Hitchhiking in India

Life On The Highway

The following is a guest post by Goutam Doulani about his hitchhiking trip from Banglore to Ajmer. You can reach him at gautamoncloud9[at]gmail[dot]com.

It all started 5 years back with the Motorcycle Diaries. That was the day I
first fantasized about going on a trip of my own. Things got busy and I
didn’t think much about it till I heard of Christopher McCandless. Holidays
were coming up and I really didn’t want to go home.

The plan was that there was no plan. All I was going to do was to stick on
the National highways asking people for rides till I made it to Amritsar and
then I don’t know. I basically wanted to get lost. Told a couple of very
close friends about it and they were encouraging. All I had to do next was
tell my parents that my exams had been postponed.

5th of July, that was the day I caught a bus from Bangalore to Goa from
where I was to start my trip. The very first day I realized what a mistake I
had a made, it kept raining for two days. The next afternoon I found the
NH17 and I started my journey. To be honest it was easy getting rides in the
beginning but as I got further away from the city it got tougher and
tougher. The next two days all I was doing was eating vada pavs, asking
every passing vehicle for rides and sleeping in cheap lodges. The rain got
the better of me and I never made it to Mumbai, I took a bus to Surat.

Gujarat turned out to be lucky for me. I got two long rides and by noon I
was in Ahmedabad. Fell in love with the Sabramati Ashram, that place is
blyss. Accommodation was expensive in Ahmedabad so I decided to travel by
bus in the night to Udaipur. By the time I boarded the bus I was drenched in
rain and had to travel that way(shivering all night). Next day was even
worse, I overslept and landed up 60 kms away from Udaipur in Nathdwara.

Rajasthan was cruel. I hadn’t slept on a bed or brushed or bathed  for the
last 3 days and I had been walking for hours with nothing but barren land on
both sides. That was when I realised I couldn’t go further. People there
expect money for rides. The fun  was lost. I finally paid a truck driver to
take me to Ajmer. The journey was over.

This is what happened everytime a vehicle stopped.
“Where?”
“As long as you are on the highway”
This way I managed to meet some amazing people on the way. They admired what
I was doing which inspired me to move on. It was fun chit chatting with
them. These truck drivers do have a tough life.

If you are travelling alone make sure you don’t panic. I don’t remember how
many times during the trip all I wanted to do was go home. You have to get
over those phases. When you have been walking for hours asking for rides and
finally someone stops you will want to kiss that person. There will be times
during the trip when you will be like “This is exactly what I wanted”.

May be 1 in every 30 vehicle will stop. You need to have patience. Someday I
would love to do everything all over again obviously with no plans.

You only got a 100 years to live so if You have ever wanted to something big
and different then what the hell are you waiting for?