Hitchhiked for 2000Kms without spending any money and got to experience things, stories and life lessons.
Hello and welcome to my blog. Let me start by introducing myself.
My name is Ankit Mishra. I work as a UX Designer at Achieveee Design & Development studio based in Mumbai, apart from that I like to take solo trips & explore places.
This is where I share my travel experiences & stories. I want to travel and seek experiences & open my mind to new possibilities.
A couple days before I started my journey, I was unable to decide my destination. However, I somewhere knew that this journey is going to be amazing than all my previous journeys, cause this time I had few things very cleared in my mind.
1. The trip has to be an ultimate adventure for me and has to takes me out of my comfort zone.
2. Want to explore some great stories and that wouldn’t be possible without meeting some great people.
3. Also, thought of visiting few less-explored places and want to spend some great time with me.
Recently I have completed a hitchhiking trip from Mumbai to Meghalaya, which is 3046 kilometers. Why? Well, mainly for the thrill of it. And I also had to take the trip anyway, since I want to visit a village and few other places in Meghalaya. In this five days of hitchhiking, I’ve covered only 2000 kilometers and lots of good stories.
Before leaving I’ve made few calculations
1. Need to cover at least 500 kilometers on a daily basis
2. Route breakdown(small cities) in between major cities
3. Best travel time(According to me): Morning 5:00 AM to Evening 07:00 PM
4. Need at least 08 hours of sleep
Routes I took during hitchhiking to Meghalaya. I’ve breakdown my journey here and while going through this I’ve met few amazing people and their stories.
1. Frustrated work life of police constable
2. How a teacher quit his job and starts earning more through MLM
3. A guy who has no fixed home & has worked in three different countries.
4. A talented truck driver who has some amazingly written poems and songs.
5. The inspiring journey of a boy from village & his great transformation.
6. The boy who regrets spending of Rs. 12000/- on prostitution.
7. A passionate rider fired by his manager & now he’s leading his manager.
And many more stories.
People who offered me hitchhiking are from different backgrounds:
Glad that, I got hitchhiked from more than 120–140 people throughout the journey. Everyone had something to tell about them. I’ve connected to few of them very deeply.
After traveled across 07 states,(Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, and Meghalaya) I’ve met people from various backgrounds. Some of them are mention below:
Life lesson from hitchhiking!
1. Don’t need anyone’s permission to start something
If you’ve decided something to do, then make sure to do it. There are only two possibilities, it may work or it may not, there’s no other way of doing it.
2. If you want something, Ask for it!
I’ve been on the road for hitchhiking and I don’t have any other choice than asking for people to help. It takes a lot of efforts to convince some people for hitchhiking, but it’s worth doing.
3. It’s okay, numbers of rejections will come to your way
There are many people who’ve rejected me for help and you can’t even expect help from everyone. Keep trying and it will lead you somewhere!
4. The important thing in life is courage
Despite being scared from inside I think, it’s equally important to be courageous from outside as well. It works seriously!
5. Thing comes to first those who’ve smile on their face
Approaching people with a smile, general good vibes and a request for a lift can speed things up. It helps me a lot to save my time while hitchhiking.
6. Sometimes luck favors to those who don’t give up easily
No one can predict about travel, It offers you things that you’ve never imagined of. I hitchhiked at India- Bangladesh border.
7. Keep your ego home, especially while hitchhiking
In hitchhiking, just as in life, you will get far more nos than yeses. Hitchhiking is highly recommendable for such people. Definitely it’ll make you kind people.
8. Discipline helps you a lot in small things
People love discipline and planned things. Sometimes it’s good to have planned and get things done on time.
In my next blog, i will share all the stories in detail and amazing places I’ve been too. If you enjoyed this post, do share with your friends!
Every month I share here my experiences as a traveler and as a designer, you can read my previous blog post here: https://medium.com/@ankitm616
Thanks for reading!
See you soon :)
