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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Topic Author's Original Post - Dec 2, 2016 - 12:41am PT
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SLC to LAX
LAX to Narita
Narita to HK
HK by train to downtown HK
Downtown to waiting for 1 hour for a taxi
Taxi doesn't know where to go even after I give him a printed address. (in English and Cantonese. Calls dispatcher and I give him the address to his cell phone and relayed to the driver. Finally after circling the block several times he finds the entrance. And drops me off.
Hand over my passport at the desk and they say sorry they don't have a reservation for me
Ok: My company business is this and the business I'm visiting is that.
Oh Mr Peater we have that.
Me: WhoooooHoooo
Finally in my room exhausted I sit down at the table and pour myself 3 fingers of scotch I bought at Narita. I can relax now at 3:30 am.
Go to bed but it's freezing in my room.
Get up to find out that the thermo has only one setting...Freeze. It's balmy outside but the windows don't open.
So I call room service to get a couple more blankets.
Finally get to sleep for a couple of hours after I don't know how many traveled.
Love HK but not the getting there part.
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Delhi Dog
climber
Good Question...
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Most of my life seems to be traveling stories.
No one wants to hear them after awhile.
I just stopped telling them.
People seem happier that way.
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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 2, 2016 - 02:13am PT
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Ok Delhi Dog
I haven't heard any of your stories. You've heard one of mine
Trade?
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Drive for 3 hours
Chug energy drink
Drive for 2 hours
Chug energy drink
Drive for 1 hour
climb in the back and sleep
ski
Rinse and repeat as needed
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hooblie
climber
from out where the anecdotes roam
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southwest wyoming, '80-'82, latching pipe in the derrick, six 10 hour days/week plus 3hrs/day travel out to the rig. loved my job, couldn't miss a day. literally. 80 hours a week with the same roughneck crew got old though. some people belly up to the bar to find a kindred spirit. in my case, my bros were finishing up the season guiding in the tetons. hitchhiking served as something of a social enterprise so daybreak sunday morning i bellied up to the dashboard of whatever rig i might hail while sashaying up the road to GTNP, traveling lite in short sleeves and a cowboy hat.
great day on the hill took a turn for even better when my climbing partner, with whom i'd done a fair bit of damage in the beartooths, pulled up alongside me south of pinedale as i marched homeward with a thumb in the air. he was finishing up a season of geology fieldwork in the wind's and i was invited to join his outfit for steaks and a slideshow up at the ranch. couldn't pass it up.
afterword, he delivered me to farson. just an intersection with a blinking light and little else in those days. traffic went from slow to nil as midnite passed, chilly too. i sure regretted not taking things into my own hands when a bigrig pulling a lowboy rolled down off south pass, crept thru the intersection and steamed off into the 40 miles of black that separated me from my bed in rock springs. my crew would be honking for me in about 4 hours, and the rig doesn't pull much pipe out of the hole without a derrick hand.
the sound of another diesel signaled a second chance, so i hunkered in the shadows till the tractor passed, then ran out to intercept the tanker he was pulling, which offered a big spare tire, suspended a couple feet below the belly. there was an instant to decide or spend the night and miss work. so there i sat, and it was up thru the gears as i stuffed my hat under the lid of my daysack.
positively no one could have seen me, and there was no reason i could fathom why we should be slowing down on this empty stretch of open road. i couldn't see forward at all but the fence posts were being swept by unsettling red flashes, we were creeping up to a very isolated hotbed of emergency vehicles, passing slowly by cops 10 feet away, visible from the ribs down, swinging red flares. finally a rolled sedan and a wrecker scrolled by and to my great relief we were grabbing gears again.
as we rumbled into rock springs those big old wheels that had been screaming in my ears revealed themselves in the city lights. they had an authoritative presence as i pictured my departure from this beast. i was hoping for a full stop, low stress affair, but it was not to be. the driver had timed a green arrow onto the westbound I-80 and i was facing a shanghai to possibly salt lake if i didn't launch NOW. i reached out and put a death grip on a pipe that ran alongside the flank of this thing and as expected my economy class seat fell irretrievably away. i hung there in front of those dually's and ran in place till i was sure of my footing, then simply let go and continued on over to the shoulder, just partway up the ramp and two blocks from beddy-bye. piece of cake. tucked myself in feeling snug and smug.
though i never saw my hat again
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Delhi Dog
climber
Good Question...
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^^ howza!
Fair enough Peater:-)
Here's a quick memory.
Perhentian Islands, Malaysia.
People eat weird things so maybe this is no big deal, but still…
The four of us were hanging out for a week in a sweet little bungalow 10 ft from amazing snorkeling on these really cool islands one early Fall week we had off from work. They’re a bit out off the beaten track even for Malaysia and it was a great find for us.
Turtles, sharks, stingrays, wild corals you name it we saw it. As a family of four this was one of our favorite kind of vacations. Lots of sun, salt, and water.
We’re at a small outside restaurant one afternoon having lunch after a long morning of exploring the backside of the island. After a contest of who-can-drink-their-shake-the-fastest our lunch came and the conversation turned to planning the afternoon and evening.
I’d ordered a tuna sandwich and when it came it was cut into little quarter squares. Funny I thought as I stuffed the first piece into my mouth; just like my mom used to make.
As I reached for the second piece I noticed some movement along the edge of it. Pulling the two pieces of bread apart I was confronted with the sight of my sandwich alive with wriggling maggots-lots of them.
Looking back now I’m surprised I didn’t vomit right there and then.
Instead, I showed the insides of the sandwich piece to my two daughters and the Misses…
I let them do the vomiting for me.
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ecdh
climber
the east
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2003 i entered Laos from China.
a month later i went to leave, into Thailand. the border guard said id not been stamped in correctly, i was missing a stamp. i said i had no idea what stamps i should have so not my fault. he said id have to recross the country after getting a new Chinese visa, re-enter Laos with the right stamps, recross the country, then he could let me leave. a process that would take at least a week.
Or give him $100 `special exit fee` and go to Thailand now.
i started getting angry till my friend pointed out this guy could detain me indefinitely in a 3rd world communist regime with my home country had no embassy. so i paid.
a month later, im re-entering Laos from Thailand, same crossing. watching the guard i see them put a single stamp in my passport, i then ask for them to double check its been stamped correctly. this makes him indignant and calls over his superior - the guy i dealt with the last time.
recognizing me, the head officer motioned to the guy doing the stamping who added the extra stamp, saving me $100 when i got to China.
bastards.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Just returned at 4:55 pm 12/2 from a 2,700 mile trip from good old downtown Ouray, Co. to various venues in Cali. Ate some turkey, saw old friends, climbed four pitches, went to the Getty Museum, added a quart of oil to the Forrester and managed to leave my credit card in a Sushi Restaurant in Mesquite.
All's well that ends well....the cats are fine and the driveway got plowed.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Wish I could tell you some of mine. :-/
We did have a crazy taxi ride in Buenos Aires a few years ago. Gave the
driver the name of the hotel.* After watching him drive aimlessly for a
while I suggested he call his dispatcher. She sent us to another hotel
with the same name, but wrong. Luckily they knew about the one we wanted
and it wasn't too far away. It turned out to be pretty nice and, I kid
you knott, we got the Elvis Suite! Swear to Nashville! The bathtub was
guitar shaped and there was a lot of really tasteless décor. Too sweet!
*Aerolineas Argentina had canceled our flight so we were given a voucher
for this hotel.
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nah000
climber
no/w/here
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^^^^ some great stories...
driving from costa rica to panama in 2007...
the usual rigamarole... we generally found it easiest to pay about $5-10 to a dude at most of the central american border crossings... these guys would save us time by speedily moving us through the right order of people to get our docs sorted, photocopied and stamped for both the importing of the vehicle and ourselves... in every instance that we used them, they got us through and on our way far faster than if we had tried to bumble through the choose your own adventure styled bureaucratic dance that often went on at some of those borders.
and so while i can still remember a couple of the dudes who helped us, the one that i remember the most was the one who helped us at paso canoas... he spoke impeccable english, claimed [and by all indications seemed to be telling the truth] that he had a university degree, but that he made more money hustling at the border...
while most of those crossings were a blur and i don't remember all of the details, what i do remember about trying to get into panama was our being taken to a small windowless interior room for questioning.
first one border official brought us into the room and had us sit down at a table with four chairs in the otherwise unfurnished room [and we were now long without our wheel greaser]...
he then left the room.
a couple minutes later in an almost stereotypical fashion, a very heavy set and sweating border official walked in alone.
he sat down and proceeded to ask us the usual questions and we did our best in our shItty spanish to give him the answers he needed.
then the feeling in the room took a turn and things felt like they were starting to go sideways...
he mentioned that he sure would like a coke.
we sat there... ok... cool... we'd like a coke too... "what's your point?"
no, we hadn't understood: he made it clear that he really wanted a coke.
hmmm... well... "would you like me to give you some money for a coke?"
he got visibly offended at the suggestion: "no!" as he almost physically brushed aside the apparent insult that my proposed "bribe" was to him.
he then pointed outside of the room...
to a vending machine in the hallway.
after sitting there for a few more moments and some confused looks between my partner and i, i finally decided to stand up...
and i went and bought a coke.
i then set it down on the table in front of him.
he opened it and took a big swig.
and then he signed our papers and we were on our way...
the only "bribe" we paid to a border official during the 13 mexican and central american border crossings we did during that trip...
and it was a can of fUcking coke...
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Winemaker
Sport climber
Yakima, WA
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Driving from Seattle to Milwaukee in my beater Econoline van in 36 hours by myself. I knew it was time to stop for coffee when I would see rats running across the hood..........another indicator was being unable to tell if I was going up or downhill.
Rode my motorcycle from Lansing, Michigan to Pittsburgh. Two o'clock in the morning going through the western Pennsylvania 'mountains' with the almost full moon and no one on the road; fog formed in the valleys and it was like driving down into a pearly ocean, to be enveloped and then rise again. Truly beautiful.
Went down to the Florida Keys from Michigan for spring break with my buddy in his VW bug, a kayak strapped to the top. Two unforgettable weeks in Bahia Honda state park, catching lobster, stealing steaks from the grocery store. Driving back on my birthday, oddly enough, through Georgia and a devastating series of tornadoes; we had to stop the car under overpasses as the storm went over, listening to the radio to know when we could go. Evil green skies and pounding rain, coming down so hard you couldn't see.
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ecdh
climber
the east
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Iran, 2001.near the Armenian border where id come to see a pagan festival but never found it. walking out i was cornered by a beast of a shepherd dog that had me cornered, the only other people about were 2 litle nomadic girls 100m away who just stood and stared. quite understandably they werent getting involved.
out of nowhere a black limosine pulls up, the window rolls down and a guy with a european accent asks if i want a ride. i tell him to pen the door then run for it, throw pack in first, jump in and pull the door shut as the dog chases me to the car and grumbles outside the closed window.
thanks, says me. turns out the guys a photographer whos also looking for the festival. we never found it and he dropped me off where i could hitch to a town.
in the town i was shown abandoned ruins of armenian grottoes, perhaps undocumented, but well preserved even in muslim territory.
that afternoon reports via pirate satellite tv said planes had crashed in new york.
and thats where the story gets really interesting...
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Psilocyborg
climber
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Long road trip, LSD papers, swirling colors, flashing red and blue lights, sobriety test, and finally released into the night.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jet-lagged first morning in Moscow BITD I go for a jog at 0500. Not a vehicle to be seen, anywhere! I make a big loop and making my way back to my hotel I realize I'm in front of the of the Party HQ! It's an immense pre-revolutionary edifice with two sets of monstrous doors made of bronze and wood. I raised my camera to take a pic of these beautiful doors when I hear shouting. I look down the block to the other entrance and see a cop running towards me! Then I noticed the Zhiguli parked across the street, clearly KGB. This can't go well. I try to decide whether to play the dumb turoid but when the cop makes like he's gonna rip the film out of my camera I break into my relatively fluent Russian and tell him I was only admiring the beautiful doors and he relented!
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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 2, 2016 - 10:10pm PT
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GCF
"118 biz trips to asia
eu-approx 20
they all blur after a while"
That is impressive. Really. I thought I'd got a lot at around 40.
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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 2, 2016 - 10:41pm PT
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I'm going through passport control to leave Qingdao, China. When my turn comes up and he scans my passport he looks up at me and says you have to go over there. Pointing at an unmarked door.
Hummm. Ok.
I go over and enter the room. There are 4 guys in military uniform and my checked bag sitting on a low table.
Please open your bag. Ok. While they rummage through it and find nothing I notice an x ray image of my bag on a screen. It shows what looks like 6 mortar shells in my bag.
So now I now why they are interested. I go over to them and motion that I want to open the bottom shoe compartment. I do so and reveal the 6 bottles of hot sauce that I'd bought in the Philippines. They are laid neck to toe and I really guess they looked bad in the x ray.
The soldiers really looked relieved to resolve the matter and let me go on my way.
When I got home I found two of the bottles smashed and sticky sauces coating the bottom of my bag. So I guess they were really kind of pissed.
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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 3, 2016 - 12:38am PT
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On one of my motor cycle trips across the US a car passing in the opposite direction is honking his horn and motioning me to slow down. Using the hand going the down motion to slow the f*#k down. Usually they do that if there are cops ahead and I'm not going all that fast. So I don't know what's up.
A mile or so later I see like a million sheep on the road. They're crossing over on their annual migration to the slaughter house or to get their hair cut.
Riding through Kansas I'm close in back of a big hay truck. Waiting for a chance to get around. It's not filled with hay bails but 3 giant rolls of hay. I'm waiting my chance to pass when suddenly one of the giant rolls of hay rolls off the truck right in front of me. I don't know what I did but it must have been the right thing. I missed the holy roller and got around the truck without falling down.
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Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
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I've told the story here on the Taco about being robbed by a hitch-hiker in the Mojave Desert. Most of my other traveling stories involve some kind of creative auto repairs out in the middle of nowhere. Like the time I made a fan-belt out of duct-tape to get over Pacheco pass.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Out of gas on a March night on Hwy 95 Nevada, 1980.
From North Idaho: the now ex-wife and I took a late-March road trip down to Vegas, via the most remote paved-roads I could find.
We were pretty much on main highways, until Elko, where we spent the night, ate Basque food, and sampled the thrills of “down-town” Elko.
We then we drove a little west on I-80 and wandered south on paved roads. We both liked exploring “back-roads & ghost towns” and expected to find some on our way.
Around Austin, we found more remote roads and trended south to the ghost-towns of Ione & Berlin, visited the state park with Ichthyosaur skeletons, and very late in the afternoon, headed west towards Hawthorne for gas, food, and lodging.
I knew Hawthorne was a little redneck shithole & home to a huge ammunition depot, but it was a cold & windy March night & we didn't have the gas to make a more desirable destination.
As darkness crept in, the fuel gauge on our trusty, first generation Subaru crept down. A few miles south of Hawthorne, I coasted our dead Subaru over onto the shoulder of Hwy. 95.
We could see some ammunition bunkers in the last light, and the twinkling lights of nearby, but oh so far-away Hawthorne were beckoning us in. I decided it would be safer to leave my wife (long-since-ex-wife) Jennifer with the car, guarding it and herself, with my trusty Smith & Wesson 22 pistol, while I hitched to Hawthorne for gas.
Nearly the first car by, stopped to pick me up. The driver was a sober businessman, who wanted to know what I was up to. After I explained our problem, he would not leave without my wife and me both in his car.
He explained: “you just don’t want to leave your woman alone on Highway 95.”
He hauled us into downtown Hawthorne without incident, dropped us at a gas station, and I was able to get a 2 gallon can borrowed and filled with gas, but not a ride back to my car.
We stood out on the street with thumbs-out for quite a while. The ex-wife got irritated and cold. (was that the beginning of the end?)
After a long while, we noticed a car-full of Indians looking us over. No surprise. It had not escaped me that Hawthorne was also adjacent to a Paiute Reservation.
The Indians pulled up beside me on their next pass by in their 1960’s land-yacht. I trotted over as the passenger side window came down, and noted two men in the front-seat and several older women and some kids in the huge back seat.
After I thanked them for stopping, they wanted to know where I was hitching to. I explained. The window rolled up, while the men and the women discussed this among themselves.
The window rolled down. The male on my side said:
“We’ll take you out to your car, but we’re thirsty.”
I replied: “Can I buy you good folks something to drink?”
After a pause, they allowed that a couple six-packs of beer would make them less thirsty.
I said: “I’ll buy some right-now for you!” “I am most grateful for you giving us a ride. “ “My name is Fritz, and I want you to meet my wife Jennifer!”
I walked over to Jennifer, who was an anthropologist, explained the situation to her, barked “go make friends,” and trotted back to the service station to buy beer.
All went smoothly. I think between women, kids, and us, there were 9 passengers in the back seat for the drive out to our car. One of the women confessed to Jennifer that the only reason they stopped to pick us up, was because they thought she was pregnant. Jennifer had a big down parka on, and was slumped over in misery against a street lamp, when they first drove by.
I’ve never forgotten the debt I owe those folks.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Great travel stories folks. Don't stop now!
Back in the early 1980’s, in North Idaho, I was driving home to Moscow with my buddy Kevin after a weekend climbing trip to some poison ivy infested crags along the Salmon River above Riggins. It was a hot early-summer evening and the car-windows were down. I was wearing loose-fitting climbing shorts, that were also cut fairly short, for freedom of movement.
As we started up Whitebird Grade on Hwy 95, I heard a faint ping as my driver’s-side door-mirror deflected an insect through the open window and up my gapping shorts. The injured bee crawled up my inner thigh toward “Big Bob & the twins”-------as a slightly concerned Fritz felt something and pawed the same area.
Yep, about then, the errant honey bee stung me right on “Big Bob.”
We skidded to a tire-smoking stop on the outside-edge of the cliff-side highway, and I was half-way out the door when Kevin, with real panic in his voice, screamed that the car was starting to roll backwards towards the void below.
With a heavy sigh, I sat back down, turned off the engine, put the car in gear, & set the emergency brake.
Then I jumped out of the car, and dropped my shorts in front of oncoming traffic.
It was much too late to do any good for my sting, but I did get to dance on the dying bee’s carcass.
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