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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Sep 22, 2014 - 04:58pm PT
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Occasionally, after careful profiling.
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Psilocyborg
climber
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Sep 22, 2014 - 05:29pm PT
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^ yup very few and far between, and I do profile.
My buddy was shot and carjacked, and then they went to his house where the guy robbed him of various crapola in the house. This POS was also aryan brotherhood.
I hitched a ride once with some guy I had met in the SEKI backcountry. It was a really weird trip. It was off from the get go, but it was either take the ride or walk from mineral king to lodgepole. Yeah not really afraid for my life per say....but it was really awkward and strange as the dude was way off kilter.
It took OVER 24 hours for him to get me from mineral king to lodgepole. He didn't want to let me go!
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wilbeer
Mountain climber
Terence Wilson greeneck alleghenys,ny,
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Sep 22, 2014 - 05:29pm PT
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Good folks in the mountains of the Northeast.
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Ezra Ellis
Trad climber
North wet, and Da souf
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Sep 22, 2014 - 05:50pm PT
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Only skiers, rafters, or climbers.
Once picked up some woman running from her boyfriend, nothing bad happened, it was just weird, and dangerous in retrospect.
Like Donini said CAREFUL profiling!
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Sep 22, 2014 - 06:39pm PT
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WAYNO!!!!!
Got ur note on another thread, sorry I missed you too, but after reading your story on this thread I am just happy that I got to meet you at all!
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anita514
Gym climber
Great White North
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Sep 22, 2014 - 06:45pm PT
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Especially when they are wearing patchouli to cover up the poop smell.
Forgot about piss smell. Incontinence is a no-go for rides in my car.
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Lennox
climber
just southwest of the center of the universe
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Sep 22, 2014 - 07:42pm PT
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I'll occasionally give someone a ride.
I saw Tucker thumbing for a ride and took him back to the valley years ago; if I hadn't known him, I'm not sure I would've stopped. I remember him telling how he was hitching one time and a couple with little kids pulled over to give him a ride; he declined the ride and scolded them for even thinking of giving a ride to someone who looked like him, or anyone for that matter, when they had kids with them.
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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Sep 22, 2014 - 08:00pm PT
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Barbarian
climber
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Sep 22, 2014 - 11:15pm PT
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Todd- Saw something like that once. 5 miles south of Lone Pine on 395 in 1981. Girl in bikini hitching. I looked at my buddy. He looked at me. We never spoke a word and drove right on by. When things look wrong, they generally are.
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Evel
Trad climber
Nedsterdam CO
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Sep 22, 2014 - 11:30pm PT
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NO RIDERS
EXCEPT BRUNETTES,BLONDES or REDHEADS!
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TwistedCrank
climber
Released into general population, Idaho
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Sep 23, 2014 - 06:25am PT
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Bumper
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clinker
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, California
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Sep 23, 2014 - 08:43am PT
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On a solo road trip soon after my regular climbing partner was married I picked up a few hitchhikers. I had a gold Dodge Dart Swinger with a with vinyl roof.
First was a guy with a fantastic conspiracy theory of how Bush senor and others were after him. This fellow had layers of delusion(inception) he talked continuously from Hollister to Merced, I have always regretted not recording his incredible yarn.
Second was John, young guy with messed up ankle. He was opening up a mine for production, outside of Mariposa. I toured the mine and crashed there for the night.
Last were two French girls, going to Yosemite.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Sep 23, 2014 - 08:48am PT
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Last were two French girls, going to Yosemite.
Don't leave us hanging, brah!
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Sep 23, 2014 - 09:07am PT
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Skiers for the most part.
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BuddhaStalin
climber
Truckee, CA
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Sep 23, 2014 - 09:39am PT
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Depends on the situation, sometimes I do, but rarely anymore. Too many bad ones in a row. Too many people getting pissed and throwing things, yes throwing things, for simply not being picked up. And many other unfortunate behaviors.
The real clincher is when people choose to hitch a ride, then get pissed that nobody picks you up or how long it takes. F*#k you. I get pissed at nobody but myself when I do this, which is never anymore. Not on purpose.
I hitched for nearly a decade, and as time went on, the more i tried to pay it forward, the more thieves, dirty hippies who bitch at you for eating meat, generally disrespectful people you got, so Im largely done. Its a bummer. I want to help people out, I know Ill need a ride someday, I have good manners and etiquette. No matter If theyre crazy religious weirdos or deadheads or have a kid with a stinky diaper, whatever, be nice, they gave you a ride you c#&%. I was always nice and polite and thankful and put up with their jesus talk or whatever because they did me a solid. Now, its just entitlement, entitlement, entitlement, and I wish them luck with that.
Its ridiculous, peoples sense of entitlement.... they cant even try to not damage your car, or you get bumrushed by all the persons friends and dogs when you give one person a ride.....no! GTFO! 4 sloppy snowboarders and a pitbull on a hemp leash comin atcha all stanky and dirty! Scratching sh#t up and wrecking your stuff.
I still take it as a case by case thing, and the important thing to remember no matter what your role, is that you dont know peoples story, on the road with a cardboard sign, or driving a seemingly empty car....
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FGD135
Social climber
Boulder Canyon Colorado
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Sep 23, 2014 - 10:15am PT
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When I'm driving up Boulder Canyon I'll sometimes pick up hitchhikers with obvious climbing gear, or in the winter if they have skis or snowboards or mebbe ice gear, since I'd likely be headed up to do the same activities, but I never, ever pick up other folks...used to do that, esp. when heading back down the canyon from Eldora, but after giving a ride to a guy in Ned, who after he got in the car, told me he was going down to Boulder to meet his ~parole officer~, I decided to quit giving rides to random dudes, and even dudettes.
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Oregon
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Sep 23, 2014 - 11:19am PT
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Many years ago my partner and I decided to do East Butt of El Cap. We usually stayed in Upper River and my wife wanted the car, so she dropped us off maybe 6:00AM with the understanding that we'd just find our own way back to the campground when we got down.
Climb went OK. We got down maybe 11:00 and scampered across the meadow to walk back and maybe catch a ride back to the pizza deck.
After only a couple minutes, a car stops and the door swings open. I get in the front, my partner in the back, and the driver says
" buckle up. I drive like a maniac"
He didn't have to say it twice.
Turns out he is the Yosemite Jailer, and he is running a little late for his shift change, so he apologizes he can't take us to Curry. And he's true to his word on the driving.
"No problem," I said. "just drop us off at the Bridge and we'll take the shuttle the rest of the way"
He's in the left lane, so he shifts right to let us out and plows right into the back of a Mercedes stopped at the stop sign.
Nobody hurt, mostly just scratches on both cars-- maybe a bent bumper and broken headlight on his, so my partner and I get out, thank him for the ride, and scurry over to the bridge stop just as a bus gets there. He's left to sort it out with the other driver.
Laughed our asses off the rest of the afternoon, poor guy.
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TheSoloClimber
Trad climber
Vancouver
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Sep 23, 2014 - 03:14pm PT
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I used to hitch hike a lot, and still do if I don't have an alternative option. 90% of the time, the reason I got picked up was because my climbing rope or snowboard was visible.
I had an incredibly sketchy experience a couple years back picking someone else up however, that pretty much ensures that I will never stop for natives though.
Shortly after I moved to Vancouver, I was asked to drive an SUV to Calgary as a favour. I ended up leaving around 9 at night as that would put me in Calgary just in time to catch the Greyhound back to Van.
Anyways, it was around 1 in the morning or so, and I was just past Kamloops, aka, the middle of absolute nowhere. Deserted stretch of highway, no houses, no street lights, nothing in either direction for a long ways. I'm bombing along, music blaring, and I see a girl on the side of the road waving her arms over her head in the universal signal for "I'm over here!"
My immediate though was that she had been in an accident or something, so I slam on the brakes, U turn, and pull over on the wrong side of the road. Roll down the window, and I'm like, hey, what's wrong, are you in trouble? Like, what's going on?
This girl was native, and from 4-5 feet away, I could smell booze on her. She's wearing glasses, and all she says is, Hey. Can I get a ride?
I was a little confused to do anything more than just say, um, okay. She hops in the backseat, I turn around, start driving. I'm like, alright, where are you going? She looks around a bit, and verbatim says, "I can't see." *points in the direction I'm driving* "That way".
I was so sure I was about to be hijacked, my adrenaline was through the roof. I turned my music waaaay down so I could be on full alert. I had noticed she never put her seatbelt on, and my only thought was, if I hear a sound or click that could be a gun being cocked, or a knife being opened, I'm slamming on the brakes and sending this bitch through the windshield!
She ended up passing out, and I woke her up around Salmon Arm to ask her if this is where she was going. She just said, no, keep driving. I pulled over for gas in Revelstoke, some 5 hours later, and told her this was as far as I was going. She says, okay, and doesn't move. I'm like, seriously, get out!
She gets out, I leave, get to Calgary, take the bus back.
I actually think it was the adrenaline that kept me awake through the night, but yeah. I don't pick up native people anymore.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Sep 23, 2014 - 04:02pm PT
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This thread is bringing back some memorable thumbing
I had only lived in the Southwest for a few years. Indian reservations were a place of mystery. I figured they hated white people. When I drove across the Navajo Nation for the first time (1983?) it was the middle of the night, I was afraid to even slow down. The medicine man scene in Natural Born Killers was supposedly shot in the Fourcorners area, it captured my perception perfectly.. Fast-forward 25 years and I found myself in a bad situation and hitching from Shiprock to Gallup (ironically not too far from a corner in Winslow, AZ) to try to catch the Amtrak. By this pointin my life I had discovered the Dine to be wonderful people, and true to form they got me to Gallup, with beers along the way.
I have since driven across the Navajo Nation many times and often picked up locals hitching. No bad experiences, always an interesting time. Some do not talk, just look straight ahead, not being rude, it is just their reserved nature. I picked up one local who talked nonstop from Tuba City to Flagstaff. I declined his invite to party in Flagstaff.
Gotta keep the hitching culture alive people!!!! I tend to agree that I do not usually pick up hitchers in the city or on major freeways. Dogs are also a deal killer.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Sep 23, 2014 - 04:15pm PT
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No bad experiences, always an interesting time
One of the more traumatic experiences of my life was driving across the Res
on a Friday night. I got run off the road by drunks twice in an hour! Then
I got to Gallup and saw the numbers who couldn't even walk. But we digress.
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