Welcome to Britain by Thumb

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Why Hitchhiking?

For most people, hitchhiking is the thing their parents told them never to do.

It’s a relic from a safer past, an outdated mode of transport reserved for creeps, clowns and escaping convicts. The thing in horror movies that ends in murder and mutilation.

But most people haven’t hitchhiked.

In reality, it’s (usually) none of those things. Jumping in a car with a total stranger is exhilarating, rewarding and affirming, unmatched elsewhere in modern life.

But what makes it special is the stories.

Ask anyone who’s done it and they’ll tell you a great tale. I met a guy the other day who said his last driver was drunk and had a boot full of snakes.

Of course, it’s not all roses.

There is a reason people don’t do it anymore. It is risky and it’s slow. It involves hours of anxiety and uncertainty as you stand in the rain, wondering why you didn’t just get the train like everyone else your generation.

But that’s what Britain by Thumb is for. You don’t have to do any of the hard work.

I’m Nico. I’m a writer and photographer and I first hitchhiked aged 5.

My brother and I got lost in the woods and were saved hours later by a passing car.

After a 14-year break, I next thumbed a ride in 2017 while backpacking in the States. Too young to rent a car, too poor to buy one, I hitched up the West Coast. It changed my life.

Not only did it show me a whole new way of seeing the world, but it taught me a valuable lesson: that most people are not mass murderers. Most people are pretty nice.

I came home to Britain and went to university and never once thought about doing it here. It may have worked in America, but Brits were obviously too miserable to pick anyone up.

The Guardian had declared hitchhiking dead as long ago as 2009 and concluded that we were all too afraid of each other for it to work anymore. I didn’t know anyone who had done it this side of the millennium.

Rather than take my chances, I booked a one-way trip back to the States; this time I’d thumb from Chicago to New Orleans…

But then Covid hit.

I spent the next two years locked down at my parents’, dreaming of getting back on the road even if America was off the cards.

It was then I realised that Britain by thumb was the answer.

I could see the country I grew up in and meet the people in it. What’s more, the trip would be something of an experiment—a chance to find out what happens when you throw yourself at the mercy of the Great British Public.

So late one Sunday afternoon, I got myself to a lay-by on the edge of Edinburgh.

Within 3 minutes, it was raining.

Within 5, I’d been given the middle finger.

Within 10, I was on the backseat of a Mercedes-Benz.

I haven’t stopped since.

And—touch wood—I haven’t been murdered.

I’ve recorded my experiences here on Substack and I’m writing a book. My journey has been on the news and in the press and I’ve spoken at the Royal Geographical Society, all in an attempt to revive the dying art of hitchhiking.

In those three years, I’ve found that British people are far from the sour, miserable bunch we like to make out. Generally, the country is full of decent people, people with fascinating lives and remarkable stories.

I’ve met anarcho-feminists and drug dealers, slaughtermen and war veterans, refugees, a Tory MP and even a couple having an affair. Their stories enrich the places I pass through, splash colour onto the landscape and breathe life into towns and villages.

Together they weave a unique textile of the UK as it is today.

So join me as I traverse the country, and sometimes beyond, seeing the world from the passenger seat of strangers’ cars.

You never know where you’ll end up, nor who you’ll meet.

But you can be sure it’ll be entertaining.