These absurd photos of young travelers on the ‘Hippie Trail’ raise a lot of questions

Let me see that sarong

A young hippie couple from France and Australia stroll on the beach in front of a group of nuns in Goa, India, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Pity the boho “traveler” in search of authentic adventure in foreign lands. Softened by privilege, backpack crammed with the comforts of home and the expectations of youth, they crave “experience”—which usually means a brush with poverty, maybe a hint of danger, in a place where nobody knows their name. In the 1960s and 70s, intrepid European and American naifs were traipsing the backroads of South Asia on an unofficial network of cheap hostels and budget bus fleets known as the Hippie Trail. There they hoped to encounter enough ancient spirituality—and hashish—to inject their bourgeois existence with a trace of meaning. From Turkey to Iran, Afghanistan, Nepal, and India, travelers found respite in the local customs and garments of the Global South, surviving thriftily on the strength of their currencies. They called themselves the “Intrepids,” and for a decade—before geopolitics would render many of these places a no-go for Westerners—they came in earnest for fun and sun and a sense of identity in a post-1960s world. The stateside movement crested and receding, Hippie Trail was a last-ditch effort of the counterculture.

In 1971, Paris Match sent photographer Jack Garofalo down to see what the kids were up to. His pictures show the idealism, the sweat, the awe, and the tender moments shared by young travelers on the trail. Garofalo also exposes the naiveté of subjects whose faith in exotic authenticity is at best misplaced, and at worst an absurd display of cultural insensitivity.

Portrait of a hippie called ‘Sadou’ in Varanasi, India, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A Hippie Trail traveler nonchalantly reads while surrounded by extremely poor Indians sleeping on the ground in Mumbai, India, in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Hippies from Boston, dressed in local apparel, play pungi—an instrument used by Indian snake charmers—in Varanasi, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

On a hill overlooking Kathmandu, a Tibetan monk gives a Buddhist lesson to a group of hippies in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A group of French hippie travelers smoke hash in their hotel room in Kabul, Afghanistan, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A hippie prepares to shoot heroin on the beach in Goa, India, in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Portrait of a hippie surrounded by marijuana plants in Kathmandu, Nepal, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A young traveler bathes nude in the Ganges River in Varanasi, India, in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Three travelers at a bar in Goa, India, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

American Hippie Trail travelers from Boston ride a rickshaw in Varanasi, India, in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A group of hippie travelers on the roof of a bus in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Four hippies dressed in Afghan clothing clap along to music at a local festival in Kabul, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

Crowned with flowers, smoking hash, and holding a cat, a hippie sits with locals under the pergola of a restaurant in India, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)

A traveling couple bathe themselves from a village well in Goa, India, 1971. (Jack Garofalo/Paris Match via Getty Images)