Hitchbiking is a mixture between hitchhiking and biking. Instead of waiting on on single spot for someone to pick you up you are sitting on a bike, already heading for your destination. Once a Pickup Truck or a big truck shows up you rise your thumb and smile. Some prefer to park the bike at a good Hitchhiking spot and wait there for a ride. Others again have a folding bike and can put their bike in a normal car trunk/boot.
Pros
- You never get stuck in a bad hitchhiking spot.
- You are more flexible because you don't depend on traffic. That means you can explore little beaches, rivers or villages with your bike and hitchbike further afterwards.
- You get a lot of attention if you are running on your bike with all the luggage.
- You can enjoy beautiful parts of your trip on a slow pace with your bike and skip bad or hard ones while hitchhiking.
- You have a really interesting and visible story (a bicycle). User:taborda found out that people are much more friendly and helpful as they easily believe you when they see the bike and bags
Cons
- It's harder to find someone who has room for you and your bike. You might consider getting yourself a fold-up bike, which uses significantly less space. (or to use a small bike that easily can take the wheels out and pack it in a big plastic).
- You need good bags which should be easy to remove from the bike.
- It's not that obvious for the driver that you want a ride. (it makes it easy to have the bike in a big bag - that will also help on not making cars dirty with chain oil)
- In countries with tiny cars and few trucks its really hard.
Tips to make hitchbiking easier
- Pack your bike (with a small plastic tarp and some rope i could pack my hole bike) to avoid oil stains in cars.
- Use a small bike that can take the wheels easy, can be useful to strip it out of not needed items (like mudguards) to make packing smaller and easier
- Try to ask car drivers for a hitch, not only vans and trucks, people tend to be really helpful with cyclists, and you will find out a bike can fit in many cars (on the back sit). (User:taborda hitchbiking from amsterdam to portugal just got one hich offer where the bike actually didn't fit, on all others it was possible to fit the bike - mostly in "normal" cars)
Countries
It's better in places with lots of pick-up trucks, such as South America.
guakasite, wikitalk can confirm it's very easy in Ecuador. Hitching with 2 people and 2 bikes was very easy.
taborda can confirm hitchiking with a bike in europe (holand, belgium, france, spain and portugal - July/August 2011) was not that hard (actually as easy as without a bike - or even easier)
Alternate Forms
Another idea might be to use a TINY folding bike, like this one or for longer trips, a real touring bike that folds up into a suitcase or a car trunk, like this 21-speed Pocket Sport from Bike Friday.
Bike-Hitchhiking
It is also possible to get a lift on a bike, as documented here: Bike Hitchhiking Only recommended in city centers full of bicycles, such as cities in the Netherlands ;)
External Links
- GreenCycle Blog
- Thoughts from Corinne
- Berner Werner about HitchBiking
- Meinhard's thoughts about HitchBiking
- Velowiki, a project started by guaka (talk) in April 2013