A Hitchhiker's Guide to North America

Dennis and I waited, thumbs out, at an on-ramp to Interstate 8. We stood next to a sign that read “Yuma 170 mi”. A full-sized pickup with an extended camper shell lurched over to the shoulder. It had Colorado plates.

The driver leaned across the cab to the open passenger side window. “Where you fellows headed?” he asked.

“Mexico,” I said.

He opened his door, came around the back of the camper, and unlatched a rear door. “Throw your gear back here, and you can ride in front,” he said. In a moment we were sitting three across in the cab, headed east on the freeway.

“You know why I stopped for you guys?” the driver said as he merged into the fast lane.

“Why?” Dennis asked.

“Because you had all your stuff together. No suitcases or garbage bags.”

From Lightbulb Coffee

In 1969, I hitchhiked across the length and breadth of the US and Mexico. This was perfectly practical in those days. The Baby Boomers had formed their own counterculture. Rides were easy to catch, and it wasn’t just other hippies that pulled over. Long-haul truckers, traveling salesmen, and local pastors were just as likely to stop.

Sometimes, things were not so easy.

Once a pal and I were dropped off in high, rocky country along the California/Oregon border. It was January, and the wind was icy. The highway was deserted for minutes at a time. We walked along the shoulder in the direction of Grant’s Pass, in order to keep warm. We shared a bar of chocolate, which seemed to give us a jolt of energy.

After a couple of hours of marching, the chocolate calories were burned, and we began to feel the chill. We had no alternative but to keep walking. Just as were beginning to realize that we might have to walk all night, a car’s headlight beams splashed our shadows across the granite boulders ahead of us, and a sedan pulled over. The driver dismounted, and came around and popped the trunk.

“I can take you down the hill to Ashland,” he said. We stowed our rucksacks in the trunk, and he drove us to his house outside of town. Arthur and I were allowed to sleep on his kitchen floor near the warm stove, and his wife fed us breakfast the next morning.

Lots of generous people gave me rides for thousands of miles back in those days. You’ll meet some of them when you read Lightbulb Coffee.