Getting a move-on

10 November 2012
1AM
Danica's Track My Tour was updated to say she and Susan are in a cattle truck, going from York all the way to Dover. I am so jealous. YORK TO DOVER?!?!?!?!? That's some incredible luck right there. I bet it's karma because Karan was making faces at the teams we passed on the A1 in the afternoon.

Anyway we've been in the cafeteria here for ages now. I'm ready to spend the night sleeping here. Goodness knows I need a break. We're unabashedly charging our phones at the power points - smartphones are energy guzzlers, and we need these phones to last as long as we can. So I'm just gonna charge them out in the open and I don't care how cheap it makes us look. No shame.



2AM
What just happened?! We were waving our whiteboard outside when a police car came up and asked what we were doing trying to get a hitch to London at 2AM, and then they said they'd try to arrange for a bit of help for us to get a bit further south. We're going all the way to Grantham! In a police car!!!!!!! AT 2AM IN THE MORNING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I apologise. I'll stop overdoing the exclamation marks now.

You have no idea how grateful I am to be going somewhere. Anywhere. I don't even know where Grantham is. (Note to self: look it up in the AA road map later.)

2.45AM
The policemen were really funny - one of them showed us a video of his daughter performing at a school singing contest. They're such nice and friendly people. Who would have thought policemen would pick us up? It's such a different kind of police culture from Singapore, here, I feel like they feel properly committed to helping people in England (even weird Asian hitchhikers trying to make it across four countries!).



Anyway we're in Grantham now and it doesn't seem like anyone is here at all. We've stood outside at the petrol station trying to get vehicles to pick us up, but doesn't seem like we're getting much luck at all. We're gonna call it a night and pick up again round 5.30AM, I think. Need some rest. I'm exhausted.

5.15AM
I woke up before my alarm went off. I'm so glad I had those couple hours of rest. Brushing my teeth for the first time in what feels like forever - I feel grimy and gross after having been out and hitching for 20 hours now. We're brushing our teeth in a public toilet in a service station. I guess there's a first for everything.



7AM
Our next ride is headed south of London, so we're getting a ride to somewhere near Cambridge. Or Bishop's Stortford. I don't really know. I'm at the point where I'm pretty much jumping into a car as long as it's moving, even if I don't really know where it's headed. It's an incredible piece of luck we even managed to get a ride anywhere at 7AM in the morning.

It's been a rough start, with some people pretty much lying to our faces - when we asked them at the station if they were going south they'd tell us no they were headed north, then we'd see their cars take the route south. I get it if they don't wanna take us - three crazy psycho-looking people hitchhiking, I'd be wary myself - but I would really have appreciated it if they'd told us 'no' instead of lying that they were going north instead. Oh well.

8.15AM
Karan woke his cousin in London up and asked her to come pick us up from Birchanger Green Services. She thought Karan was lying or that he was crazy, and Karan had to take a photo of himself standing under the sign that said "BIRCHANGER GREEN" to prove that he wasn't messing with her. Lol. Until she comes by... It's Starbucks time! I'm ready for my morning toffee nut latte!



9AM
Karan's cousin and her friend came to pick us up and I swear they are absolutely the sweetest people alive. She's driving us so far to another service station further south so that we can get another hitch to Dover, which is where the English Channel is nearest to France and where we'll be getting our ferry. We haven't quite decided yet how we're going to do the ferry hitch. Karan's cousin brought us pasta (?! WARM HOT COOKED FOOD?!?!?!) and nice good proper food. I am in love with her already. Why do nice people make me want to cry? :')



I'm really tired, so I'm gonna take a nap I think. Wake me up when we get to Maidstone.

11.30AM
We managed to get a hitch to the port of Dover!!!!!! It's a really nice guy in a little hatchback, and it's absolutely pouring outside. This guy is really nice, he's telling us all about what he wants to do with his life and how he's stuck in a job in insurance and how he can't really just uproot and go do something different because he's got a long-term girlfriend and all that... Well I guess since he's never going to see us ever again, no harm in offloading your worries onto a few strangers eh?

1.15PM
We're hitching in the car of a guy whose car stinks of cigarettes, but at this point I'm not going to complain as long as we're moving. It's a left-hand-drive car, so it's a guy from the EU, I think he's Greek or something. He talks really slowly and seems to have problems speaking in English, so I'm just trying to play along.

We were standing for ages by the side of the road trying to get a hitch off the cars headed up the ferry ramp, until I figured out that we need to register our names with the port and immigration authorities so we needed to ask people who hadn't yet bought their car ferry space. This guy is really hesitant and we could tell he didn't really wanna do it, but we managed to convince him. I'm saying to hell with niceties and playing polite now. IT'S FULL AGRESSIVE MODE.

2PM
THE FERRY IS MOVING! WE'RE GOING TO FRANCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Holy shit this place looks like luxury compared to what we've been doing for the past 29 hours - it's got proper, nice chairs and tables, shops and things like that. It's gorgeous. Gorgeous. Everything just seems so much more amazing because we're all so exhausted right now.




Show the reindeer some love.

I'm kind of terrified that we'll have to hitch at night again like we did by the side in Blythe, so I'm going to buy myself one of those high-visibility vests. Also there are Haribo gummy bears here and I feel like buying them all.

By the way, the guy isn't Greek - he's German. Oops. Hey I couldn't tell - I only had a quick glance at his passport! And both nationalities start with the letter G. That's a horrible excuse.

We're getting to France in just over 2 hours! Yay!