Hitchhiking from Prien am Chiemsee to Budapest went surprisingly smooth and just 4 cars later we were in the heart of Budapest where we met up with Laura, a friend of Doris from Romania. From the central station we began our mission of finding a cheap hostel which wasn't as easy as we thought. All hostels seem to have Western-European prices. After following some dutch girls who had navigation software on their phone for a while we couldn't find the hostel they were looking for. They took a cab to find another hostel and 20 seconds after they were gone we realized we were standing infront of the hostel. Doris and I could share a bed and one of us only had to pay half price, which is pretty awesome. We stayed there for 2 nights while seeing the city. Budapest in summer looks really nice, but the heat was just a bit too much so we mostly hopped from shadow to shadow. Of course we had to try some Goulash while we were there and in the hostel they recommend us a good restaurant nearby with affordable food and beer.
When you chance your Euro's to HUF be careful that they give the right value back. We've seen everything from 250 HUF for 1 euro at an ATM till 293 at a money exchange place. It seemed that the small shady looking exchange places offer you more than banks so watch out for that!
Hitchhiking out of Budapest was easy. It took us a while to find a good gasstation at the end of the city but once we found it there were lots of local hitchhikers. Our goal for the day was Bratislava in Slovakia. After a few minutes or so of waiting someone took us til somewhere in the middle of Hungary since he was going back to Vienna. This was a bit of a mistake on our side. It's the best to hitchhike straight to your destination out of Budapest cause once you are at a gasstation in the middle of the country you should expect to be stuck for hours. The traffic sign in front of our hitchhiking spot was covered in testimonials of people who were stuck there for up to 8 hours. Luckily for us it only took 2,5 hours before someone took us to Vienna airport and from there we took a countryside road to Bratislava. We dropped our luggage of at the train station and explored the city for a while. Bratislava in summer is full of Dutch and British high-school graduants who want to get as drunk as possible for almost no money and the city itself is nothing special. We went back to the station to get our luggage and from there walk into the forest on the hills outside the city to find a place to put the tent for the night. Sadly after walking for what felt like hours up a steep hill we were still in the city and couldn't find a place where we were hidden from sight. We walked back into the center and got a hostel instead. The next day it took us 3 hours to leave the city but then we finally got closer to the Czech border.
The ride we got into Czech was probably the craziest of the trip. We got picked up by a couple (husband and wife) in their 30's. The first think they asked was " You're from the Netherlands, do you have anything to smoke?". When the answer to that question was no the wife didn't want to take us anymore but the husband convinced her. About 20 minutes later the wife started screaming in English that her husband had to pull over on the side of the highway to let us out. He wanted to let us out at a gasstation and her response to that was yelling WHERE IS THE PETROL STATION!! after some more screaming we got dropped off at the side of the highway. We walked for about 10 minutes to the first exit we found and from there hitched a ride to Brno with a man who worked on the wine fields. Again we got dropped off on the side of the highway cause he thought it would be the best place for us. He sent us on our way with a 2 liter bottle of wine fresh from the barrel. The goal for the day was Prague but after the police came and sent us away from the highway it became clear that we should focus on getting a place to sleep. We took a random bus to the middle of nowhere and we found the perfect location in a forrest to put a tent and make a small fire. When we jumped off the bus we realized that the bottle of wine was still inside the bus so sadly we didn't have a chance to enjoy it. We weren't bothered by anyone or anything and had a good night of sleep in the tent. The next morning we wanted to walk to the first gasstation on the highway in the direction of Prague. It seemed closed from the busstop where we got off, but that wasn't the case. We had to walk through a field, go over a small creek, walk through thorns and dense bushes, walk on a railroad-track, climb an overpass and then walk on the side of the highway to the gasstation. When we got there we were tired, itchy and sweaty. We grabbed a coffee and then a couple asked us where we wanted to go. We answered Prague and they drove us straight to the center.
In Prague we found a hostel in a schoolbuilding. In the summer they just put old iron hospitalbeds in the classrooms and call it a hostel. There were about 200 drunk people in that place screaming and breaking stuff all night so we woke up pretty tired. We took the countryside road back to Austria to visit some friends there. We then got picked up by the vice-mayor of a small town who showed us some local architectural projects, bought us ice cream and then invited us for lunch in a local fish restaurant. It seemed our luck finally changed. It was a really relaxing way to spend the afternoon. Later that day we got a ride with a girl from Linz who told us about a street-performer festival the next weekend and offered us a place to stay during that time. From Linz we took a train to Wankham to visit our friends. The next day it took us a loooong time to get out of Linz, but when we finally did we got a direct ride with 2 guys who were going on a canoe trip in Slovenia. They took us to Bovec. They had a big tent, which we put up on the side of a river. They brought lots of beer and Jagermeister and at 3:00 AM it was finally time to sleep. After sleeping like babies for 4 hours we were awoken by two people saying: Polizia, Documenta (or something like that) It wasn't an official campsite where we put the tent and apparently that is illegal in Slovenia. Luckily for us the cops were corrupt and we only had to pay 40 euro's in cash. 8 Euro's a person isn't that bad to camp at one of the most beautiful places I've been so far.
Wanna know what happened next? Stay tuned for part 2...
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Hitchhiking 6 countries, 10 days part 1
Hitchhiking from Prien am Chiemsee to Budapest went surprisingly smooth and just 4 cars later we were in the heart of Budapest where we met up with Laura, a friend of Doris from Romania. From the central station we began our mission of finding a cheap hostel which wasn't as easy as we thought. All hostels seem to have Western-European prices. After following some dutch girls who had navigation software on their phone for a while we couldn't find the hostel they were looking for. They took a cab to find another hostel and 20 seconds after they were gone we realized we were standing infront of the hostel. Doris and I could share a bed and one of us only had to pay half price, which is pretty awesome. We stayed there for 2 nights while seeing the city. Budapest in summer looks really nice, but the heat was just a bit too much so we mostly hopped from shadow to shadow. Of course we had to try some Goulash while we were there and in the hostel they recommend us a good restaurant nearby with affordable food and beer.
When you chance your Euro's to HUF be careful that they give the right value back. We've seen everything from 250 HUF for 1 euro at an ATM till 293 at a money exchange place. It seemed that the small shady looking exchange places offer you more than banks so watch out for that!
Hitchhiking out of Budapest was easy. It took us a while to find a good gasstation at the end of the city but once we found it there were lots of local hitchhikers. Our goal for the day was Bratislava in Slovakia. After a few minutes or so of waiting someone took us til somewhere in the middle of Hungary since he was going back to Vienna. This was a bit of a mistake on our side. It's the best to hitchhike straight to your destination out of Budapest cause once you are at a gasstation in the middle of the country you should expect to be stuck for hours. The traffic sign in front of our hitchhiking spot was covered in testimonials of people who were stuck there for up to 8 hours. Luckily for us it only took 2,5 hours before someone took us to Vienna airport and from there we took a countryside road to Bratislava. We dropped our luggage of at the train station and explored the city for a while. Bratislava in summer is full of Dutch and British high-school graduants who want to get as drunk as possible for almost no money and the city itself is nothing special. We went back to the station to get our luggage and from there walk into the forest on the hills outside the city to find a place to put the tent for the night. Sadly after walking for what felt like hours up a steep hill we were still in the city and couldn't find a place where we were hidden from sight. We walked back into the center and got a hostel instead. The next day it took us 3 hours to leave the city but then we finally got closer to the Czech border.
The ride we got into Czech was probably the craziest of the trip. We got picked up by a couple (husband and wife) in their 30's. The first think they asked was " You're from the Netherlands, do you have anything to smoke?". When the answer to that question was no the wife didn't want to take us anymore but the husband convinced her. About 20 minutes later the wife started screaming in English that her husband had to pull over on the side of the highway to let us out. He wanted to let us out at a gasstation and her response to that was yelling WHERE IS THE PETROL STATION!! after some more screaming we got dropped off at the side of the highway. We walked for about 10 minutes to the first exit we found and from there hitched a ride to Brno with a man who worked on the wine fields. Again we got dropped off on the side of the highway cause he thought it would be the best place for us. He sent us on our way with a 2 liter bottle of wine fresh from the barrel. The goal for the day was Prague but after the police came and sent us away from the highway it became clear that we should focus on getting a place to sleep. We took a random bus to the middle of nowhere and we found the perfect location in a forrest to put a tent and make a small fire. When we jumped off the bus we realized that the bottle of wine was still inside the bus so sadly we didn't have a chance to enjoy it. We weren't bothered by anyone or anything and had a good night of sleep in the tent. The next morning we wanted to walk to the first gasstation on the highway in the direction of Prague. It seemed closed from the busstop where we got off, but that wasn't the case. We had to walk through a field, go over a small creek, walk through thorns and dense bushes, walk on a railroad-track, climb an overpass and then walk on the side of the highway to the gasstation. When we got there we were tired, itchy and sweaty. We grabbed a coffee and then a couple asked us where we wanted to go. We answered Prague and they drove us straight to the center.
In Prague we found a hostel in a schoolbuilding. In the summer they just put old iron hospitalbeds in the classrooms and call it a hostel. There were about 200 drunk people in that place screaming and breaking stuff all night so we woke up pretty tired. We took the countryside road back to Austria to visit some friends there. We then got picked up by the vice-mayor of a small town who showed us some local architectural projects, bought us ice cream and then invited us for lunch in a local fish restaurant. It seemed our luck finally changed. It was a really relaxing way to spend the afternoon. Later that day we got a ride with a girl from Linz who told us about a street-performer festival the next weekend and offered us a place to stay during that time. From Linz we took a train to Wankham to visit our friends. The next day it took us a loooong time to get out of Linz, but when we finally did we got a direct ride with 2 guys who were going on a canoe trip in Slovenia. They took us to Bovec. They had a big tent, which we put up on the side of a river. They brought lots of beer and Jagermeister and at 3:00 AM it was finally time to sleep. After sleeping like babies for 4 hours we were awoken by two people saying: Polizia, Documenta (or something like that) It wasn't an official campsite where we put the tent and apparently that is illegal in Slovenia. Luckily for us the cops were corrupt and we only had to pay 40 euro's in cash. 8 Euro's a person isn't that bad to camp at one of the most beautiful places I've been so far.
Wanna know what happened next? Stay tuned for part 2...
Monday, July 8, 2013
Tomorrow it's Eastern-Europe time!
Tomorrow morning Doris and I will leave for Budapest. We will meet up with a friend of her there and then the 3 of us will hitchhike through Czech, Poland, Latvia and the other Baltic countries. We only have 10 days for the trip so we'll just see how far we can get in the limited amount of time. It will be interesting to see how it is to hitchhike with 3 people, hope it'll work for us. It's gonna be cheaper for us to be on the road in those countries and to be here in Germany so that is also a plus of the trip.
The blogpost following that trip will probably be the last travel post in a long time. Once we're back in Germany we will need to make as much money as we can to afford the move to Vienna mid August/early September. It's getting a bit stressful when we think of how much we have to work to make it happen but it is possible :) It will help us out a lot if you, the readers, could click on that nice shiny yellow button on the top of the blog to contribute to this latest adventure ;)
Living in Vienna together will be a whole new trip and I really look forward to that experience.
The next blogpost will be a longer one with all the pictures and other goodness of the trip and an update on the 'move to Vienna' hustle.
Take care and see you next time!
Thursday, July 4, 2013
Göteborg v2.0
Got back from the trip to Göteborg about 2 days ago so I guess now I have to write about it. Here it goes!
We left early on a sunday morning, thinking we will make it to Göteborg around Tuesday, maybe even wednesday morning, since it is about 1500km from Prien. When the first ride of the day took us all the way to Nürnberg it started to look like we might make it sooner then that. When we got dropped off at a gasstation before the highway exit we had to go on we quickly got a ride again by the wife of a German bigshot politician in a fancy BWM. We flew with 200km/h over the highway and you couldn't notice it inside the car. The engine was quiet, the seats where comfortable and we saw the the road as a blur from the window. During our attempt up north we met more interesting people and the day ended in Denmark. We got stuck at the opposite side of the highway from the gasstation where I slept the last time I went back from Sweden.
The gasstation on this side was an exact copy and they let us crash there for the night and gave us a cup of coffee the next morning at 5:00 AM when we had to leave again. Denmark seems to be hitchhikers paradise and almost everyone is willing to help you out. If they can't give you a ride they are always friendly and give you tips and directions on how you can reach your destination as fast as possible. We made it to Fredrikshavn at around 9:00 AM and an hour later we were on the ferry to Göteborg.
It was awesome seeing my friends there again but we were very tired from hitchiking and only sleeping a few hours on a floor so I have to admit I fell asleep at a bar when we went out in the evening. The next few days were spent hanging out inside when it was raining and walking through the vast parks in the city when it wasn't. The nighttime activity usually involved going to a bar and being shocked again by the insanely high prices in Sweden. We went out to camp on top of a hill one night when it was warm. We had a campfire and roasted some marshmallows while seeing the sunset over the city. It's great that you are allowed to camp anywhere you like on public domain, as long as you clean the potential mess you made. Another thing that I can recommend to visit if you are in Göteborg is the sailors-museum in the district Majorna. The museum is free of charge for people under 25 and only 40kr (about 8 euro's) for people over 25, and then the ticket you get is valid a whole year and you can visit as often as you like.
The next sunday morning we tried to hitchhike the ferry back to Denmark, since people who buy a car ticket can take up to 5 passengers with them. Sadly after 6 hours and 2 ferries we had no luck so we went back to our friends. The next morning we tried to hitchhike the highway down south to Malmö and then go back to Germany from there but after 2 hours of waiting we hadn't succeeded in leaving the city. This and my last hitchhiking experience in Sweden (waiting +-6 hours) makes me conclude that you should not try to hitchhike there. We decided to just pay for the ferry to get out of the country but we gave hitchhiking it one more shot and to out surprise it worked. Some old German people who were on a roadtrip with their campervan took us so that saved us about 70 euros. We hitchhiked back south from Fredrikshavn and guess what? We ended up at exactly the same gasstation again so now I've slept there 3 times in about a month and a half. Again we got a nice separate room and a coffee to go in the morning. People working nightshifts are awesome!
The next day we got a lot of short rides to get out of Denmark but once we were in Germany we had luck with 2 truck drivers who took us a long distance and one man who went past the gasstation only to see if there were hitchhikers and he took us to Munich where we arrived at 23:30. From there we took the train back to Prien and finally were able to catch up on sleep.
For all the pictures go to my facebook page https://www.facebook.com/DrifterInEurope
If you like what you read don't forget to like and share the facebook page, the blog and maybe even support us through paypal!
The next trip will start next week. We will meet up with a friend of Doris in Budapest and hitchike from there to Estonia.
See you next time!
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