New book traces the historic hippie trail of 1960s

The journey of thousands of European and American young hippies to "point east" -- India, Nepal and other south Asian countries -- in the 1960s and 1970s is now documented as a combined history in "The Hippie Trail: A History" .

Tracing a geographic trail from the West, the book establishes the hippie as a pivot, and builds a socio-political and personal context around their new-found inspiration to travel.

The book is authored by historians Sharif Gemie and Brian Ireland, and it focuses on the detailed past of the overland journey undertaken by people of the hippie culture, through the historian's eye.

It records the "joys and pains experienced" by young hippies en route to the East.

The account is structured around questions like: "Were the travellers simply motivated by a search for drugs, or was there something deeper that they were looking for?"

Chapters like "The hippie as a tourist" and the "The hippie as a pilgrim" seek to position the hippie on the spiritual tourism map.

--IANS

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