Blazing the HIppie Trail in 1959: Calcutta to London on £10

Christmas 1959. Calcutta. Gerry is stranded in the Salvation Army Hostel. He meets Geoff, an eccentric loner. Only a few pounds between them. How to get to Europe overland? No money for a plane; no internet; no guide books; no ATMs; no clear options. Across Asia to Europe by land. But how? There must be roads, sure to be, but which one’s the right one? Can you hitch-hike? What about buses and trains? Nobody seems to know. There are no hippies, so there’s no such thing as the Hippie Trail. Nobody will even hear about hippies for another five or six years, It’s all a bit chancy, really. But they give it a go.

Mixing it with oddballs, con-men, magnificently decorated generals, a family of wrestlers, and eccentrics of all stripes, they freeze in the Himalayas, upset the military-industrialists in Darjeeling, bathe their sins away in the Ganges, get arrested in Afghanistan, dodge the Shah’s SAVAK in Teheran, rid themselves of lice in Istanbul, have a splendid party in Macedonia, and fetch up finally in 1960s London in a base across the road from the Sun in Splendour pub in Portobello Road.
All on ten pounds.