The hippie trail was the journey taken by hippies and others in the 1960s and 1970s from Europe overland to and from southern Asia, mainly India and Nepal. One of the key elements was traveling as cheaply as possible, mainly to extend the length of time away from home. As such, journeys were carried out by thumbing (hitchhiking), or cheap, private buses that travelled the route. There were also trains that traveled part of the way, particularly across Eastern Europe through Turkey (with a ferry connection across Lake Van) and to Tehran or east to Mashhad, Iran. From these cities, public or private transportation could then be obtained for the rest of the trip. These journeys evoked the 17th and 18th-century tradition of the Grand Tour.
Read more about Hippie Trail: The Route(s), Guides and Travelogues, New Trails
Famous quotes containing the words hippie and/or trail:
“It has to be acknowledged that in capitalist society, with its herds of hippies, originality has become a sort of fringe benefit, a mere convention, accepted obsolescence, the Beatnik model being turned in for the Hippie model, as though strangely obedient to capitalist laws of marketing.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)
“The trail of the serpent reaches into all the lucrative professions and practices of man. Each has its own wrongs. Each finds a tender and very intelligent conscience a disqualification for success. Each requires of the practitioner a certain shutting of the eyes, a certain dapperness and compliance, an acceptance of customs, a sequestration from the sentiments of generosity and love, a compromise of private opinion and lofty integrity.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)