Yesterday I drove a 1991 Jeep with a 5 speed manual. It was interesting to learn but I stalled too much. It was harder because the wheels were big and it was a tall vehicle. I'm going to get more practice though.

The freewheel-system I don't know, only the half-automatic transmission "Saxomat" (called "Olymatic" in 60ies Opel's or "Hydramatic" by Borgward).
All NSU RO 80 had this system, with such a car I made the experience.
You choose the gears like usual, but there's no clutch. It's just a sensor in the top of the stick-shift. No big deal, you only had to learn, not to let the hand on the gear-shift while standing at the traffic-lights.

My NSU 1200 C had also such an half-automatic, but it was broken, when I bought the car, so we mounted a conventional gearbox and a clutch-pedal in the car.

I drive one almost every week... sort of. See, our '89 Toyota Van has a problem with the transmission, where it is reluctant to switch gears as you accelerate (it is a 4-speed automatic by the way). So when you need the engine to shift up (it's mostly a problem from 2nd to 3rd and from 3rd to 4th), you just have to let off the gas a bit ("feather" it as my dad says) and it will shift. It is almost like driving a manual, except that there isn't any fussy clutch involved.

@BeanBandit: I have: my first car, a 1939 Rover 12. The useful feature of the Rover's freewheel was that you could turn it off, which I did when driving in London on account of the engine braking; I would turn it on at weekends when I went home to the Midlands. Probably sounds crazy but it worked for me!

How many of you have driven a car with a freewheel?
I've driven two - Saab 96 V4 and Wartburg 353W, the gearchange can be made just by easing the throttle, when changing, you don't need to press the clutch.
Only problem is, there's no engine braking in this kind of system, you must use the brakes lot harder, like with automatics.

Here's the story:

My biological father died yesterday and he had a 1989 Toyota Pickup that has a 5 speed manual. There is also a possibility that I may inherit it from him, and if I do someone on my dad's side of the family will teach me to drive stick. I met most of my dad's side of the family for the first time yesterday and they really want to keep in touch with me. So if I learn to drive stick, I'll be practicing on the Toyota.

Guess what everybody? I finally drove a stick shift... sucessfully! On the way home from taking pictures of my grandmother's Crown Vic, I drove our manual Honda the whole 22 miles, and I only stalled it twice! I got some strange looks from a guy in a Lumina after stalling and restarting after a stoplight turned green I bet he's never even driven a manual in his life, what does he know?

Something interesting about manuals though, when you are on the freeway and in fifth gear it seems just like driving an automatic. In fact, when I got off the highway after driving on it for 20 miles, my dad had to remind me I was driving a manual, and that I had to shift

But usually you cannot destroy a gearbox, when you don't do that.

Sometimes I'm irritating passengers, when I'm pushing the stick-shift a bit more powerful in its position. The simple result is, that I'm a K 70-driver since nearly 18 years, and the gearbox of the K 70 is a typical NSU-construction, with the NSU-typical jamming gear-shift, especially for the 2nd gear. So a long-time NSU-driver uses a bit more power to choose the gear.
This is no problem, because the gearbox knows it. I never had a broken gearbox in my several K 70 or my NSU 1200 - even if I always shift violently.

The most horrible experience I had with a quite gone 300 000 km-VW T3-Transporter, I as a loan for a weekend from annother guy. It's gearbox was nearly totally gone (it was also changed and not original). during that trip I got several aggressivity-attacks, so I crashed the gear-shift with footkicks in its postion.

In our south Africa-vacations in 2003 once I was pissed about our rental car, a 2001 Renault Megane. For my opinion the gearshift was very jerky - so I was angry and took both hands for using the gear-shift.
The result was, that my wife was getting angry and has thrown me off the driver's seat - so I've seen the country as a passenger. My wife drove the whole 4500 km.

I use that technic nearly all the time when choosing a lower gear, it works better even if the gearbox can handle it without that.

Nowadays it's easier to drive stick-shift-cars. In the ancient past, when the gearboxes weren't synchronized, you had the make the "double-declutch" ("Zwischengas" in German) by choosing annother gear.
It works so:
1.pushing the clutch
2.put out the gear
3.let the clutch back
4.short push on the gas without a gear
5.pushing the clutch again
6.put the other gear in
7.let the clutch back.

Quite tricky it's with that truck:
http://imcdb.org/vehicle_125484-MAN-630-L2AE.html
It has the "wanker-gearshift". You have to lift the stick shift up and down for getting the next gears.