Review
former radio producer... travelling across the world to New Zealand for free through the offers of people on Twitter.' --The Bookseller, 16th July 2010
`sounds unbelievable... All it took was one tweet, a little trust and Paul was off to travel.' --Liligo travel website and blog, 13th July 2010
Abandoned in America, lost in Paris, covered in cockroaches - and saved by kindness.' --Headlines from The Review section of The Mail on Sunday, 11th July 2010
`sounds unbelievable... All it took was one tweet, a little trust and Paul was off to travel.' --Liligo travel website and blog, 13th July 2010
Abandoned in America, lost in Paris, covered in cockroaches - and saved by kindness.' --Headlines from The Review section of The Mail on Sunday, 11th July 2010
Review
Featured on -- Excess Baggage BBC Radio 4 Featured in Thomas Cook Travel 'He made it from London to New Zealand. Yet more amazing, he sounds like a decent, modest witty guy.' The Times 'Genuinely funny... easy-to-read and hard-to-put-down... it's unremitting and utterly addictive.' Real Travel 'Smith flies, sails, rides and begs his way across the globe.' Wanderlust 'I really enjoyed the book and have been spreading the word. Amazing.' -- Iain Morris, TV Producer (creator, The Inbetweeners) 'A madcap and frankly inadvisable adventure... hugely enjoyable, very funny.' -- Martin Kelner, columnist for The Guardian 'Smith is one of our true British eccentrics and should be saluted. He is fearless and possibly quite mad.' -- Alex Lester BBC Radio 2
Product Description
There were five rules of Twitchhiker: o I can only accept offers of travel and accommodation from people on Twitter. o I can't make any travel plans further than three days in advance. o I can only spend money on food, drink and anything that might fit in my suitcase. o If there is more than one offer, I choose which I take. If there is only one, I have to take it within 48 hours. o If I am unable to find a way to move on from a location within 48 hours, the challenge is over and I go home. Bored in the bread aisle of the supermarket one day, Paul Smith wondered how far he could get around the world in 30 days through the goodwill of users of social networking site Twitter. At the mercy of these rules, he set his sights on New Zealand - the opposite point on the planet to his home in Newcastle. All he had to do next was explain the idea to his new wife. In an adventure wrapped in nonsense and cocooned in daft, he travelled by road, boat, plane and train, slept in five-star luxury and on no-star floors, shmoozed with Hollywood A-listers and was humbled by the generosity of the thousands who followed his journey and determined its course. @twitchhiker I can send you to Wichita by Greyhound if that's any good… Sent 10:13 AM Mar 12th I was more or less in the exact geographical centre of a different continent, and a nameless woman some 4,000 miles east in Dublin was buying me a bus ticket...
About the Author
Paul Smith (@twitchhiker) is a former Sony award-winning radio producer based in Newcastle. He currently has 11,000 followers on Twitter and blogs about travel at http://www.twitchhiker.com.
