Gliwice

Gliwice is a city situated in central-southern Poland almost in the middle of A4 motorway motorway.

The A4 is the main transit route from Germany to Ukraine.

It's pretty easy to get either in or out of the town. Therfore you may drop into for a beer or tea or decide to stay for a night instead of staying in Katowice, which is more expensive.

Map of Gliwice

Before reading the below's tips, you need to have a look at the city map to get a brief idea of the road location.

Getting out of the town

From Gliwice, in Poland, one may easily hitch the following directions

West

By A4 motorway to:

• Opole/Wrocław/Legnica/Germany direction: Berlin & Görlitz

You may easily get to the A4 motorway entrance No. 307 from the city center by the following buses:

• Time table59 kierunek Direction Żernica Pętla,
• Time table194 kierunek: Leszczyny Czereśniowa
• Time table710 kierunek: Szczygłowice Kopalnia

All the timetables are given for the stops situated near the Gliwice main Railway station unless it's stated different. You may check ALL timetables of the buses in Silesia area sorted either by stops or by line or number ("Przystanek" in Polish lng) at this website

You need to get off at the bus stop called Trynek Ogródki Działkowe. It's the 5th bus stop from the railway station. The stop is situated just at the entrance to the motorway.

It is a 4 km long walk from the centre.

It's a pretty good hitch-hiking spot at the entrance to the highway as there is a parking lot allowing the drivers to stop easily.
You may hitch here at night time too as the area is full of lamps. It's open area so it's a bit chilly & windy during winter. The only shelter against rain is the bus stop.

The only disadvantage of this place is that the directions to West (Wrocław) and East (Kraków) goes together at this point and separate some 100 m further after the park lot & highway sign.

It's impossible to hitch after the parking lot (unless you will continue to walk along the entrance road and get down to the motorway, which is illegal) as the separated roads are 1 car narrow and driver can't stop without blocking all the traffic.

New service stations are being built on both sides of the A4 motorway 300 m away from the exit (they will be legally reachable on foot by a bicycle path)

From my observation (a working day) 75 % of the traffic is direction East (ie. Katowice, Kraków). Therefore if you head for Wrocław its better to walk along the entrance road down to the motorway to catch the transit traffic (Average awaiting time 22.6 minutes (working day, day light).

This Entrance/Exit (307) is the best to get off at, as it’s the shortest way to walk (in case you arrive too late to catch a bus) to the town center. If you are arriving from East direction ignore the main Entrance/Exit (with a sign Gliwice CENTRUM & 44 Tychy) and get off at the next one (no. 307).

There is a lot of place to put a tent for a night without any problems. Just move away from the road to avoid the noise.

East

By A4 motorway to:

1. Katowice/Kraków/Tarnów/Rzeszów/Przemyśl/Ukraine direction Lviv

all the same as with getting to West direction, as it is the same entrance.

By National Road No.44 to:

1. Mikołów/Tychy

There are 2 options:

• You may take the bus No. 32 or 41 (directly to Mikołów)] and get off at the 5th stop on a straight way to Mikołów/Tychy.

As Long As I live in here I never used this option I always asked for a lift at the traffic lights, therefore I'm not able to give you any mean await time

• Walk some 5 min to Mikołowska street (2 bus stop)and start asking drivers of cars stopped by the traffic lights.

this option is the fastest but Polish is necesary

The Car matriculation system is:

SMI - Mikołów

ST - Tychy

South

By National Road No.78 to Rybnik and the Czech Republic direction Ostrava.

There are three options to hitch this direction.

For the tips how to get to the proper place look for the tips from the [1] Mororway A4 Section.

• When you get off at the described bus stop you just need to cross the bridge over the motorway A4 and start hitching there.
• You may also get off one stop earlier and ask drivers @ by-the-road tankstation after Billa supermarket. There are sometime poeple waving thair hands by the road - still an option if you don't speak polish enough to ask drivers. Mean await time to Rybnik is 17,2 min (Working day in a day light)
• Expert option (for those who speak polish): Ask drivers stopped at the trafic light near a Kathedral 5 min walk from town hall as all the transit traffic is stopped there (permanent trafic jams during rush hours)

North

By National Road No. 901 to Olesno (junction with NR no.11 to Poznań)

By National Road No. 78 to Tanowskie Góry (juntion with NR No.11 to Poznań)

Getting into the town

More practical details and tips will follow.