Hitch-hikers

DavidF

A couple of years ago I had a funny experience. I was doing a few favours for my brother in law, which was basically driving his refrigerated Mercedes sprinter from uk to Europe with loads of various descriptions. Anyway im on the Dover to Calais ferry and coming down stairs from the trucker cafe on board (Cheaper food for the freight guys lol) and two young ladies of university age approached me and asked where I was going. I told them my destination was Sweden cant remember the town. They then asked if they could hitch a lift and my initial reaction was NO way lol. I would have done years ago but in today's climate of "all men are deranged woman beating murderers " I have a little bit of self preservation im afraid.
Anyway they appealed to me with a tiny bit of oh please ect and then trumped me with "We are from Oxford Uni and we are on a challenge to see who can get the furthest from the Uni over the summer holiday. All sponsored ect raising money for whoever (I forget im afraid). So I called my BIL and gave him the story just double checking it was ok with him as it is his business ect. He okayed it so I said yes and they travelled with me in the van from Calais To Sweden where they bid me their farewells and thanked me for helping them.
They were great company for the several hundred miles we spent together. During the journey they were getting text's/messages and facetimes ect from the others involved in the challenge. Turns out one pair of the group had got themselves all the way to Brazil after getting to Heathrow and hitching a lift on some plane (How I have no idea but I can only imagine either family worked for an airline OR possibly freight may have taken pity lol). But it was all legit and the girls showed me their friends bragging with selfies taken in front of various landmarks including the airport ect ect as documented "proof" to verify how far they had got.
The girls I picked up were still very much up for the challenge though and to this day I have no idea who "won" nor how far they got lol.
Good experience for them all I suppose while raising some cash for good causes.