Eating for free

I've sort of been thinking of doing the whole hitchhiking, Jack Kerouac thing. It's a pretty half baked idea, but the main thing that stops me from doing it is I don't know how I'd go about eating. Is there some way I could eat from the earth or something. What's the best way to do this. Maybe I should read some Kerouac.

 

Well you could go freegan?
It's all about 'liberating un wanted food' or in other words, dumpster diving!

 

Another way to go is to find a rural camp site and go primitive. Hunt and gather. Just an idea

 

Kerouac always had money. Or ususally had money. Or made money on the road. He didn't live without dough all the time. Read, live, experience, write it. Work from the pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea

 

Well, in theory you could learn about wild edibles. They are always available and I would venture to guess there is not a city on earth that doesn't have some weed growing that you could eat if you were absolutely starving. Make sure you are competent with it though, or at least have an excellent guidebook.

 

I've done a fair amount of free traveling...mostly in warm seasons though.

Dumpster Diving is like my true love! grocery stores for produce and other random stuff, resteraunts sometimes if you are immediatly hungry. It's a great source of food, just clean it up after- or sometimes thinggs are still wrapped or in packages or boxes...a lot of really good food gets thrown out in our society.

Also you can go to resterunts or stores before they close and ask if they are throwing anything out and if you might have anything like that- or even do some chores for it. I find employees to be much cooler then managers or owners then this- but every situation is different

Fruit trees!

and You can also go to lots of farms and orchards and ask for work in exchange for food and shelter- or sometimes even money.

 

Wonderful suggestions. May I ask where you done your traveling and if you were solo?

I have the wanderlust, and I've had it my entire life, but I also have a societal driven fear of being a solo woman traveler. I would feel infinitely safer in an automobile than hitchhiking, yet I know both are done frequently. You just rarely hear about it.

 

Hmm, none of those options sound particularly appealing or easy. I think I'll save up some money before I go travelling, so I can buy food.

 

I mostly travel around Canada. I've hitched as far east as Quebec (montreal is LOVELY!) and all the way to the west coast a few times. B.C. Is a wonferful wonderful place to drift around. There are lots of farms/orchards/communes/conscious communities/and areas of nature/beaches you can camp on- and lots of nice people. Traveler/hippy type culture is really common there and the mountains are really beautiful. Also went around California for a while which was really great- mostly L.A and SanFran.

I mostly don't hitch in America just because I have had a lot of warning against doing it- and especialyl cause the whole time I was there I was traveling solo- so I bussed or found rideshares online...In B.C I usually had a traveling compainion or two but htere are occasions when I hitch alone if I really need to get somewhere and have no one to come with me and it's always turned out really well. I think there are ways to do things safe and consciouslly.

Don't know though I find once you are on the road rides and places to go and stay and friends all just start to form around you. I deff. suggest having a hitching companion though if you are taking that travel method
And have fun! Hitching/living on the road is really wonderful. You can meet such amazing people with amazing lessons to teach and see beautiful things!

 

P.S. I found that Jack Kerouac mostly drank hard liquor, drank coffee, or ate pie in on the road with money that his aunt wired him money to buy...and in Dharma bums he ate a little better but that was only because of Japhy feeding him dried dhydrated asian foods for mountain climbing energy...

Please eat better then Jack on your travels!

 

curb your consumption. alot of people think they need more food than they actually do, people often mistake thirst for water for hunger. eating out of boredom. you would be surprised how far you can go on an empty stomach.

asking people coming out of resturants for leftovers. warm, fast and yummy

 

Keep in mind that time has changed since Kerouac's "On The Road". I myself want to just get up and leave to go hitch across the country when reading that book but soon get back in touch with reality.

 

Reality is subjective. Reading this thread should indicate that. To say your vision of reality meshes with everyone else's is egotistical.

It is wise to be careful and to be aware, and obviously things have changed since Kerouacs day, but traveling is still most definitely possible. I have met many people who do so, just by attending Rainbow Gatherings.

 

Well, I agree with everything you said. I think you kind of took my post the wrong way. Using the term 'reality' was only meant as a joke.

Also, I am perfectly aware that traveling is still possible. I plan on maybe doing it myself someday (oh, that would be heavenly!) However, it IS more difficult to come by than in those times. One should keep that in mind when planning to venture into a Kerouac-inspired road trip. I only meant it as a warning.

In fact, I forgot to mention that if you DO plan on going through with this, you should seriously consider going with a group. Not only is it more enjoyable to have (and meet!) some comrades, but it's also MUCH safer.

 

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I did the "hitching thing" in 1978 _& even then it wasn't like Kerouac's "On The Road". I left Santa Fe New Mexico with a big sign that read New England Please. Not 1 Trucker picked me up, I got hassled in Texas by a couple of drunkin wiseguys in a fiat (it was a very small car back then & they stopped & hassled me to get in- - I drank a beer with them and assured them that me and my back pack wouldn't fit ,and they finally left)
A GTO (very fast car,back then) stopped & the next thing I know we were going a 100 miles an hour- in the rain- with this guy drinking little millers & throwing the bottles out the window. I had him stop by lying to him that I had to throw up, when he stopped I thanked him and went on my way
I have a million stories - most good, but I posted a few that weren't so good because that was 1978 ,I cant imagine doing that in 2009. As a matter a fact, I dont even see anyone hitching anymore.
I camped out a lot, I stayed in cheap motels in TN & Ark. I had a few bucks so I ate when I needed to,once I went into a diner ,when a family of 6 left, I ate the bread and drank the water they left behind (got thrown out)
Never got hassled by police until I got to NJ- Got a ticket for "Begging a ride on an Interstate" can ya believe it?

Be careful, times have changed-My advise as a 58yr old ol"man is to re-think this idea.
All dreams dont have to come true yaknow, if you just dream about the days when it was kinda Kool to do things like this-that could be good enough

JJack

 

just fyi: http://www.richardblackman.com/

 

I was just thinking about how easy it might be to do the following as a source of free food... although some may question the ethics, if you got to eat you got to eat. A lot of stores are switching to using completley sealed dumpsters only accesable from inside the building and are locked from the outside, which is why I've come up with this elaberate plan. Here's a breakdown:

1. Wake up and make sure you look presentable. Shave, comb your hair, etc...
2. Put on a nice white collared shirt with a tie and some slacks - look professional, this plan is all about disguise.
3. Know the supermarkets around your area, where they are, what their schedules are, etc... and acquire for yourself one of their uniforms. If it's wal-mart your after, get one of those blue vests & a name tag (don't use your real name though). This is an infiltration operation - and the fact that you have a tie will signal to the employies that you have a superior position, and they probably won't question you. Walk around with a clip board like your inspecting the place.
4. Here's where the fun really begins. Your hungry and don't want to spend a buck. Have your get away car (or wagon) parked as close to the back of the grocery store as you can get it. Go in the front wearing regular clothes, find the bathroom, change into your disguise, and head straight for the back. You may have to do a little exploration to figure out where they are storing discarded/expired/damaged products and leftover bakery items before they get hauled into the dumpster or just figure out how to get into the dumpster itself.
5. Make sure you have any tools you might need to get the job done faster and quieter. Bags, box-cutters, flashlights, walkie-talkies (if you go with a friend to have a lookout). Pretty much at this point, get your shit and get out. If somebody comes up and starts questioning you - be prepared to bullshit. Although it's best to use your ninja skills and avoid being seen at all while the food salvaging is in process.
-"What are you doing? What's with the bags?"
-"New composting experiements from the state, they are buying expired food from grocery stores all around, but only certain kinds... I have the list right here."
... I don't imagine, if you play it cool, that anybody will give you much trouble. If a manager is getting suspicious, probably best to just get out of there.

* So that's extreme freeganism there. I don't encourage doing things like walking out the back door with brand new packaged food in storage, that's a much more risky game because they inventory that, and if large quantities go missing they'll start checking cameras. But they don't keep track of their garbage! And don't form any patterns, try to take as much as you can without getting noticed - many wal-marts and king soopers are open 24/7. So switch it up, go to different locations, try not to hit the same place twice in a month or something.

 

You might also start a website for your bail fund....

 

mind that I never traveled in the 1950's...but I don't think hitching around and living for free is harder...like he had his troubles too- and they were the troubles of a different era...but I hitch around and live for free as do many of my friends and the biggest struggle is not getting food or rides, more being hassled by cops if you do get stuck in the city with no where to stay- but there's ways around that. I've been doing this for a few years now, I'm not saying their have not been any creepers, or that I never got cold or hungry- but I have had ridiculous fun, met amazing people, learned amazing lessons and find living in a city apartment a million times more challenging then my life on the road and can not wait until the winter is passed and I can ride my thumb west again to the mountains...

...it's just a different way of living. you need to be safe and mindful and think about what you are doing. you don't need to be a drain on society, you can find ways-safe ways- to give back, get food, and live pretty well...

 

wow, that's a pretty ninja form of dumpster diving do you do this?

I usually where my scrappier clothes if i'm crawling around in the dumpster, and just get right in the bin where no one can see you and you can take you time stocking up. I usually just have a backpack-sometimes a flashlight. Bring stuff home so I can wash it really good...often though stuff is packaged...

and the worst that has ever happened is I've been shewed away by an employee...to which you can just go back in like 5 mins, and I'm not so down with shop lifting or stealing from the back cause I dumpster a lot for the reason that I want to stop food from being wasted and to not support unethical companies. But like everyone makes their own choices.

I would venture to say by imitating an employee and wearing the uninform and stuff it might get you in a fair bit more trouble then just being a dumpster diver-but I've never tried doing it that way.