The lost Hippie Trail through Afghanistan: A time when people would travel from Europe to South Asia through Iran, Afghanistan, India, and Nepal

A European tourist photographed shopping in a Kabul market back in the 1970s by William Podlich. The Pul-e Khishti Bazaar is Kabul’s main open-air market that in happier times would envelope you in a cacophony of sights, scents, and sounds.

Another picture by William Podlich where women can be seen enjoying the pleasant Kabul weather in a park in the 1970s. The usual climate in Afghanistan is arid continental, with cold and relatively rainy winters and hot and sunny summers.

Overlanders can be seen enjoying their time together interacting with a local citizen in Kabul. Overlanders often adopted the native style of dressing. Young North Americans, Australians and Europeans were known as the overlanders as they traveled to remote destinations where the journey was the primary goal.

Overlanders would usually commute by cheap local transport or meet other Western travelers with vans and talk their way into hitching a ride with them. This is how many overlander strangers became good friends: they would usually travel in second-hand cars, VW vans and motorcycles.

In many restaurants, the owners used to put a bulletin board to help connect overlanders and facilitate communication between friends. In 1960-70s, the overlanders posted open love letters to fellow travelers on the bulletin board. It has to be noted that the restaurants still has those letters pinned to the board as homage to the establishment’s rich traveler history.