The 5 rules of twitchhiking
Paul Smith wondered how far he could travel in 30 days through the goodwill of Twitter users. He came up with five rules of Twitchhiking – and then set off
Paul Smith set his sights on reaching Campbell Island near New Zealand – the opposite point of the planet to his home in Newcastle.
In an adventure wrapped in nonsense, he travelled by car, bus, boat, plane and train, slept in five-star luxury and no-star sofas, resorts to the hair of a dog in multiple time zones and schmoozes with Hollywood A-listers – all the while wearing the same pair of underpants.
Considering travelling by tweet yourself? Here are the rules Paul used to shape his wanderings:
The five rules of twitchhiking
1. I can only accept offers of travel and accommodation from people on Twitter
Rather than ask people to contact friends or family and ask if they’d consider helping me, I wanted to test whether relationships built within social media had real emotional and practical value.
There was another important aspect to this rule, in that others would determine when and where I travelled, with no infl uence from me – I couldn’t ask for specific help at any time.
