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2010: Bummit to Budapest
By James Murray
The Arts Tower Sheffield rarely buzzes with students at 6.45am on a Monday. On 22nd March all this changed as the 150 of us on trip 1 collected our hoodys, goodies and bummit bibles. Our first stop on our journey from the iconic starting point was Staples because of our lack of preparation. With a fresh whiteboard complete with “M1 (s) please!” in hand it wasn’t long until we got our first hitch. Our longest in England was thanks to a guy called Ben who took us from Sheffield services to Luton. Initially he was just a guy in a suit getting a Burger King but as the journey progressed so did our image of his character. Soon we knew all about his time in Amsterdam and how much he wanted to sack off his job to come with us. Following a ride in a Porsche with a mum before her sons first footy game we ended up in a bit of a hole just North of the Thames at an M25 services. We spent about 3 hours failing to hitch and trying to form some kind of strategy, the latter certainly helped to keep us entertained. Eventually a 4 by 4 Mercedes pulls up, my eyes lit up, a Portuguese guy steps out. “Dover? O.K. sure I’m not really doing anything else.” He was originally only crossing the QEII bridge into Dartford so went over an hour out of his way for us, incredible. Another fail in Dover meant that we ended up sleeping in the arrivals of the port with a few other teams and two guys taking part in the Leeds ‘Jailbreak’.
A foggy Tuesday morning didn’t really build our enthusiasm. Several Nutri-Grain bars later at the entrance of the port a few other teams told us that they’d gone for the £1 foot passenger deal offered by the daily mail. Once in touch with Beths mum to book the deal online we were all in the same boat but on a later ferry. A snooze on the sofas seemed more appealing although we know we should have been asking other ferry passengers for a lift to Germany. News returned and it didn’t look hopeful. I got off my arse just in time to meet Ian and Shaz – Jackpot!
Ian-thusiastic was comedy gold, raving his way through France, Holland and Germany to see an old army friend whilst pointing out every deer and windmill in sight. His 80/90’s pop classics took us all the way to Gütersloh from Calais. We miss you. Two more lifts and a scramble up an autobahn embankment got us to a Hostel in Hannover. Chloe, Beth and myself weren’t prepared to pay to stay so we just dropped our bags in a fellow teams room and headed for a bar. At ‘Jack the Ripper’ bar we met Till and Sebastian, two Germans studying in Hannover. I tried to find out from them if there were places we could stay for free in Hannover thinking that the train station would be a good option. Till had other ideas and as beer flowed we formulated a plan. We needed to be on a train at 1am. Underestimating the distance of the hostel from the centre of town left us running through Hannover and back to the train station with our bags - not too enjoyable after a few beers. Just like in the films, we held the doors open while the girls ran on. A huge sigh of relief was released by all but it wasn’t long until a conductor was asking for tickets down the carriage. Till and Sebastain tried to talk us out of this mess. It wasn’t looking good and we thought we would have to cough up a hefty fine until a drunk guy on the train threw up and it ran all down the isle. His mess got us out of our mess and we made a swift exit.
Seb convinced his mum to pick us up and take us to Tills house at about 2a.m. I crashed out on the floor with the girls in single beds either side of me. Waking up in a beautiful country house to our first shower of the trip and a table full of breads, meats and cheeses made us realise how lucky we were. After orange juice and fresh coffee Tills mum offered me her car for the day and I drove on the right side of the road for the first time on the way to pick up Seb. We spent the day with a few beers and an ice-cream by the ‘Steinhuder Sea’, which is a large lake with an island in the middle, and followed it up with a BBQ and a few more beers of course. Tills mum was away on our second nights stay in rural Hannover so I got a double bed to myself. Is this the life style of a hitch-hiker? The generosity of Till and his mum continued, we filled our stomachs once more at breakfast and then Till drove us 350km to Berlin! I’d been to his capital before and so I gave himself and the girls a quick tour to the Reichstag and the Holocaust Memorial before the mid-way party antics commenced. We waved good-bye to Till – Thank you so much!
It was time to move on again on Friday morning. After checking out of 36 rooms we took our sorry hungover asses to the bakery for breakfast and made some sandwiches for lunch. We were in Dresden in no time, literally, after doing up to about 240km/h on the autobahn with a local in an Audi Quatro. Dresden has been heavily redeveloped after being flattened by the World War bombings, still feeling unproductive we relaxed in a beer garden overlooking the river and the reconstructed buildings. Time well spent. It turned out that few that made it into Dresden were making it out again for free. At dusk we put our thumbs away and retired to the train station to spend the night with about 40 other bummiters. A decision was made to buy a discounted group ticket to Prague while it was offered from a very grumpy ticket office worker. This was a major low point as it took my team just over our £15 budget, however I’ve wanted to see Prague for a long time and could look forward to the fact that I’d be on my way in the morning. The police kindly let us all stay in the station but warned us that the lights would go out and people would walk through in the early hours on their way home from nights out. Subway sweetened the mood by giving me 5 cookies to share, playing cards emerged and a game of hacky sack entertained the lads. This didn’t end so well, a repeat dislocated knee caused a bit of a scene and the police ended up staying the night watching over us.
Ever heard of a Selk bag? Well its sleeping bag with arms and legs that you can walk around in, like a onesie made of sleeping bag material. A range of people from sober and drunk took particular interest and apparently I feature heavily in the locals photos on their stumble home. None of the poses performed around me woke me up and I’d go as far to say that it was a pretty dam good nights sleep.
Finally we’d dumped our bags in a fantastic Prague hostel called ‘A plus’ and the search for food and refreshment begun. Refreshment came in the form of Czech beer and my lunch came on two separate plates – winner! A collection of sausages, soup, duck, dumplings and drinks totalled less than £10 each. A whip round of the sights brought us back to the merriments to end our day. Bring on Budapest!
Leaving Prague wasn’t going to be easy on a Sunday. A local took us on a bus to the best hitch spot and we waited it out with bummiters and non-bummiters all heading south. In almost three hours we’d gone 20km down the D1 but two hitches later we were in Budapest. Our final lift had been the longest of the day with a German couple on a 16-day road trip. A mixture of stories and half a giant Toblerone that I’d had since Sheffield were shared along the way. The remaining chocolate was given as a gift before we posed for each other’s photos and departed company. Thank you so much to everyone who made our epic journey complete!
An almost a full day was spent relaxing at the Turkish baths with Beth and Chloe, amongst others, before the end party. At this point memory becomes hazy and I think I’ll leave it there.
Bummit, just like tic tacs, full of refreshing little lifts!
Trip Total:
Aprox. £350 inc. registration, bummit hoody, return flight, new board shorts, several full stomachs, great beer, amazing times & £18 on travel.