Where Have All the Hitchhikers Gone?

Back in the mid 1990s, at my hillwalking peak, I picked up lots of hitchhikers in the Highlands - and hitched myself when I didn't have access to a car. Most hitchers were other young walkers, or foreign students backpacking on a budget, and the A82 - and west coast in general - was always easier to cadge a lift up than the A9 or A93. (At the time I assumed it was because people on the west coast were friendlier.)

I only once picked up a fellow who wasn't perfectly pleasant, a grumpy middle aged man in combat gear, and only once accepted a lift from someone odd - a Free Church minister; although friends have stories of crazily dangerous drivers, or being invited into a stranger's home to 'take a shower'. Most people I've met hitchhiking were pretty interesting, and there have been some real characters, like a Buddhist monk whose acceptance of fate as to whether or not he would get a lift inspired me, or the Skye-based author Alastair Scott.

But I have to tell you that I haven't seen a hitchhiker for years now. Where did they all go? Do young people visiting the Highlands have enough money to get the bus, or are they afraid of hitchhiking? Or am I just heading north at the wrong times? I would really like to know whether or not hitchhiking is a lost art.