nine ball flash
The Hitchhiker's Guide to Europe
back home

An account of a journey undertook by my brother, Nathan, and I. He wrote the below, so don't blame me for the spelling (he's dislocksick). I actually just sorted out all the mistakes by sticking it through a spell checker but after I did so I realised it is a lot funnier left how it he wrote it. This has been on the far side of my website for a while so sorry if you've read it before.

Luke and me have traveled quite a lot over our short but compact lives.
We have been to lots of countries (France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Luxemwhat'sit'snam, Holland, Ausria, Hungry, Slavinia, Croatia, Romania, as well as England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland).


The '97 Spain Trip.

This is a report of the trip we took last summer. We were hoping to hitch-hike to the Costa del Sol to meet with some friends we have down there. And this is the way of it.

We got our first lift from our parents who gave us a lift as far as Bedford and were we split and got down to Dover by that night. Luke met up with an old couple who paid for our ferry tickets- so they could have the Duty Free slip. The next day we took a train to Paris Nord(North) station and walked in to the center of Paris.
That night (about 1am) we were walking by the river when we sat down on a bench. I was having a nap when a man came up to Luke and sarted explaining that this was the place were "special people" came to "think".
"Er...what?" Luke was saying.
"Would like to come and stay at my house for the night?" the other guy was saying.
That's when I realised that there was no females around.
"I get it!" I said and we quickly but smoothly left.

That night we slept at the Palace(out side it). The next day we went up the Eye Full Tower and got some pics of Paris. There is no where at the bottem of the tower where you can leave your bags so we had to carry our heavy packs all the way to the top. We made some paper airoplanes to throw of the to that didn't work very well. We then did some street theater at the bottom and then headed back along to Notre Dame.
We stayed in Paris for a few more days then hitched down to Lyon, Perpignon and then on to Bacalona, Spain were a few interesting things happened.
I got droped off at the top end of the city so I had to walk all the way down to the massive fountain that we had said we would meet at (cos it was the only place in the city we knew) and then we went down to the beach. When we were asleep our back packs, and everything in them, were stolen.
This was a bit depressing cos now we only had (between us)

  • two sleeping bags.
  • one towl
  • three t-shirts
  • one pair of trousers
  • one pair of shorts
  • two pairs of shoes
  • one passport
  • a water bottle.
  • not much money
    Our tent, cameras, snorkling gear, juggly stuf and the rest had gone. Off we went to the police station.
    How ever. After walking 2 miles to the British Consulet for a letter to say that Luke's passport was stolen we felt a bit hungry. We didn't have much money. All our street theater stuff was gone. We had to make some money so we made up the Plunkie and Plunky act. We bourght two mop heads and some bin bags so we could stand in our sleeping bags, put the bin bags over our t-shirts and put the mops and sleeping bag bags on our heads and hit the streets. We joked, we sang we made money. People loved us.
    After doing this for a while we went to the beach for a swim and then sat down under a tree, on some grass. I was tired so I went to sleep and Luke was writing some poems; a nice rest after a hard day busking, until.
    I woke up and was kicked in the face.
    While I was snozing two big guys walked up to Luke and punched him in the head and started "damanding all our money", which was a bit stupid cos we didn't have any. One of them walked over to me and Luke shouted "Nathan!" to wake me up and worn me of the foot that was traveling towards my face. It was a bit of a shock. After a while of them thretening us and demanding all our valubles (that we didn't have) we decided we wouldn't stand for it any longer. We got up and...
    ...Luke beats one of the men up and then gets the other one off of me. Then a police man arived and a witness (who could speak spanish) told him what had hapened. I was in a bit of a state so after our second trip to the Police station in as many days we decided to go home
    On the way back Luke got the record lift of the trip; from near Perpignon all the way to Paris, 12 hours, 1 lift.(it took me 11 lifts.) In Paris we made enough money with Plunkie and Plunky for food and the fery back to England.
    Paris is a real cool place to be. We made friends with people from all over the world, were offered free drugs(that we didn't take), watched the artists, stayed on the streets untill 3 every night haning out and genraly having a good time.
    When we did get home we I stank the whole house out cos I hadn't changed for a few weeks.
    This may make this hitch-hiking sound dangerous, uncumfy and a wast of time, but I would still do it again (and I have). We were just a bit unlucky, that's all.
    I met a lot of different people who picked me up; from a house wife going home from shopping to a famous French artist to a drag artist from Amsterdam to the director of Interflora to gang taking a couple to the airport after their wedding to the owner of the nightclubs next to the Eye Full Tower to a truck driver who just wanted some one to talk to.
    Most of us hitch-hikers just want to get from A to B cheeply with out being labled as "muggers" or "car jackers", cos we are all right realy.

  • © 2001 Luke Burrage