On the road, that’s where the stories are!

Yesterday we made big progress with our journey. As often, the big started off small. The first ride took us 100 meters further. With the kind help of three men and an elderly lady we pushed the caravan up a small hill to a spot in between two petrol stations, so we were well visible.

One of the people that helped us push was Detlev from Erlangen. Unfortunately his car didn’t have a tow bar, but he did have a fresh aspiration. Within a few years he will make a motorbike trip through Africa. Beautiful detail: In his car Detlev always carries his leather children’s boots that he wore when he was 5 years old. Is that a reminder of adventure or what?

When we have arrived at our spot we start what in the caravan-hitchhiking world is known as ‘hard work’: The challenge to get a car to stop along a local road on a cold Sunday morning, using only a ‘Tow bar wanted’ cardboard sign. It is important to create the right atmosphere, so we sing. We start with the new carnaval-hit ‘I need a car with a tow bar’. To keep our feet warm on the freezing ground we also come up with an accompanying dance. Especially the ‘bunny’ move, where we hop backwards with our feet together and the cardboard sign in our hands attracts a lot of attention. So much that passer-by Jürgen Zihlau asks us who we are and what we are doing. After our explanation he says: “I am going home now, but I may drop by later to see if you are still here”. So indeed, after about an hour his red Toyota four wheel drive appears in front of the caravan. Bingo! We get a 25 kilometer lift to a service station alongside the A3 motorway. Jürgen cans his aspiration to take his wife on a campervan trip around the world in the fall of 2013, at their wedding anniversary.

When the evening falls Peter, Dachs and I agree that we do not want to spend the night at this grim place. We find out that miracles do occur, when Sonja, an Austrian horse trainer takes us away. On our way we talk about trust, horses, adventure and the to-be-founded caravan-hitchhiking school. We will offer a wide variety of subjects, including technology, psychology, cannery, geography, several foreign languages and philosophy. We also add a new noun ‘Sonja’ to the caravan-hichhiking dictionary, next to ‘caravan-hitchhiker’, ‘tow-bar population’ and ‘wireless network density’. A ‘Sonja’ means a long, exceptionally inspiring lift. She took us all the way accross the Austrian border!

After a long day, just before midnight, the Austrian Flamenco dancer Christian Krammer takes us even further, to a service station 50 kilometers before Linz. We have broken all caravan-hitchhike distance records today, thanks to Detlev, Jürgen, Sonja and Christian, as noted.