Robin was one of the most active organizers of the event. We got home at 1:30 but went to bed only at 3:30 after doing some organization related work. Robin is also very active on various hospitality networks and there was a couple of USers already asleep in the attic, one Canadian guy and one German still awake, the German completely stoned.
 
The alarm clock went off at 7am, departure from the house planned at 7:30 (occurred at 7:36) because we had a date at 8:30. The kind of date you can't really miss. Robin had written a press release about the event and had sent it to the local media companies. One of them had suggested a TV report on it, to be shown in the news, and they were already waiting for us when we got there at 8:45.
 
They fitted Robin with a microphone and filmed him getting his first ride out. The bastard actually stood at the red light, walked to the first car with an open window, exchanged 3 words with the driver and hopped in. I never had anything that fast.
 
It was planned that he would go off at the nearest gas station, where the TV crew, me, Cliff (the Canadian guy) and Hans (a freelance cameraman filming the making of the TV report) would find him again. So after he left, Cliff and me started doing the same.
 
Cliff actually found a guy in a SUV that clearly didn't want to talk to him but when he heard it was only 'till the next gas station, he said ok. Then I screamed through the street : "Is is ok if I come too?" he nodded in an annoyed way. Hans didn't even ask and jumped in before I closed the door. The poor SUV-owner had been tricked into doing a good deed.
 
Mercifully enough, the gas station was only 500 meters. He was soon allowed to enjoy the spaciousness of his rolling property alone with himself.
 
Then the TV crew decided it would be good to film Robin asking rides to drivers that had stopped at the gas station. That made his task a lot more difficult since it doesn't quite put the drivers at ease when they have to deal with someone asking them a favour, with a huge camera and a sound-taker just behind him. But eventually one guy volunteered to take him to the next gas station. The business type, with a huge Cadillac car that took him plus the cameraman plus the anchorman in his car for a 15 minutes ride.
 
Cliff had already left with Hans with another driver so I did the trip in the TV crew car, with the sound-taker as a driver. A really nice guy that writes music when he's not holding a perch behind a cameraman.
 
The business guy was actually the perfect character for our needs. He said he was regularly picking hitch-hikers, that they never caused him any trouble, and gave us some really nice piece of TV when he started driving off with Robin's bag still in his trunk, Robin running after him and banging the side of the car.
 
The TV crew left at 10am. The same evening they aired the report in the news of the main channel.
 
Robin got himself two coffee after this stressful experience and told me: "My friend, you get the next ride". So I did my usual trick: standing near the door of the boutique of the gas station, holding my sign and trying to look harmless. Chronogically, a motorcyclist came up to me and told he would have taken me straight to France if I had been carrying an helmet and if I didn't have such a big bag. Then Robin came up to me and mocked my technique, saying that he was going to show me some Real hitch-hiking, and went off to the pumps to try to engage conversation with the drivers. Then a woman came up to me and said she could take us to Antwerp, that there was probably space for us two. Ha! In your face Robin!
 
From the moment the TV crew left till we took off: 40 min. The woman was Dutch, living in France. She was travelling with another french lady, which lead us to an interesting situation. Sure enough the French woman could speak only French, so that language was good for 3 of us (Robin can a little bit too but not fluent). English was good for 3, dutch for 2. No lingua franca. So we were constantly switching, translating, misunderstanding and I love it when it is like that.
 
I can't remember how it started but we were singing songs most of the way. Dutch, French and Creol (Reunion Island language) songs. Possibly because the radio was broken. A short but very nice ride. We crossed the border and got dropped on a really nice gas station just before Antwerp.
 
The vehicle flow was concentrated into a narrow passage from where everyone that would enter the station would have to see us. We were hungry by then but, as usual, I was a bit stressed to miss the one perfect ride if we took a break so I started hitch-hiking again straight. Robin started taking pictures.
 
After 50 minutes, a Dutch guy with his Dutch mother came up to me and told me he could take us to... yeah, you heard it my friend: PARIS! Ooh yeah! It was a long but quick ride. Just a small break for food. The guy happened to be working in the same building block Robin was working in. They'll probably meet again often for coffee. We went through a dozen of heavy rain storms on the way. I unconsciously prayed for good weather. Unconscious prayers work better.
 
Their destination was "Pont de l'Alma" so they dropped us in front of the Eiffel Tower. It was 5:20pm, 7h20 after the departure of the TV crew, no more than 8h from home. Great score.