Before coming here, most of us had close to no hitchhiking experience, except for Bojan who had been traveling with hitchhiking for maybe the entirety of the past three years. But when we arrived and realized that Romania is a nice country for hitchhiking, we go through it straight away, and were out and hitchhiking on most of the weekends.
Now hitchhiking is a very nice method of travel, on of the reasons for this is that you meet plenty of people and hear so many amazing stories. The second reason is that it is good for the environment, for example, if a man was planning to go from point A to point B, and for that he would cause pollution X, by hitchhiking and that person picking you up, you decrease the pollution per person by two. Hitchhiking is also very cheap, and according to some, the most enjoyable way of travel. Last reason would be, here, especially in Romania, that using hitchhiking usually is faster than trains or buses (sad but true).
Of course there are many cons as well, but the pros still surpass them.
Now, hitchhiking here in Romania has proven to be quite the experience, it is, in fact, a very amazing country for hitchhiking, but there is a catch, sometimes complications arise, as during the communist regime here, people due to the lack of public transport used a form of hitchhiking to get around. So after sometime the country started to modernize and get many tourists, I'm guessing there were a lot of complications as some of the locals probably asked for money from hitchhikers, I reckon there were plenty of conflicts too. Somehow, it reached a point where the Romanian Government made asking hitchhikers for money illegal.
Now hitchhiking is a very nice method of travel, on of the reasons for this is that you meet plenty of people and hear so many amazing stories. The second reason is that it is good for the environment, for example, if a man was planning to go from point A to point B, and for that he would cause pollution X, by hitchhiking and that person picking you up, you decrease the pollution per person by two. Hitchhiking is also very cheap, and according to some, the most enjoyable way of travel. Last reason would be, here, especially in Romania, that using hitchhiking usually is faster than trains or buses (sad but true).
Of course there are many cons as well, but the pros still surpass them.
Now, hitchhiking here in Romania has proven to be quite the experience, it is, in fact, a very amazing country for hitchhiking, but there is a catch, sometimes complications arise, as during the communist regime here, people due to the lack of public transport used a form of hitchhiking to get around. So after sometime the country started to modernize and get many tourists, I'm guessing there were a lot of complications as some of the locals probably asked for money from hitchhikers, I reckon there were plenty of conflicts too. Somehow, it reached a point where the Romanian Government made asking hitchhikers for money illegal.
Even though they have this law, some drivers may after all ask for money, or act awkwardly to imply that they want you to pay them. In these situations, if it's before getting in the car, it's best to just not go in, or if already in a car, when the driver asks for money, best option is to say either that you don't have money or that you'll call the police, judging by the situation.
Aside from this tiny chance for the driver to ask for money, hitchhiking in Romania is amazing, usual waiting time is less than 10 minutes, and people are helpful.
A good source for more information about hitchhiking:
http://hitchwiki.org/
And remember, when going on a hitchhiking trip, always take a towel, and maybe a potato.
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