Do you ever see hitchhikers these days?

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I would do it today. But, I would only take a backpack to hold the water bottle, extra set of clothes, nexus 7 and a camera and post a online journey blog called something along the lines of "Hitchhiking across America with Truckers." And on the way back I would just do it with regular people.
 
Originally Posted By: Thax
I surely dont . A friend of mines Father was stabbed by a hitchhiker on 395 going into DC one night. My fathers friend is a gnarly Marine Vietnam Vet and he defended himself by throwing the guy out of the car at 60mph and continued to drive home with a knife in his shoulder. He wasnt even going to go to the Hospital till his wife made him lol . Every time I see a hitchhiker I think of my friends dad.d


That is an awesome story...sounds like it should be in a movie!
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2

Flipping the question - did there used to be as many sign-holding beggars as I see these days? Not many around here, but in the cities and in the midwest I see a LOT.


I see this often at the highway exit I use for work (crummy industrial area). One dude stands there as his girlfriend sits nearby on the ground fiddling with her smartphone. It amazes me the amount of people that hand over cash.
 
It was a great way to travel....in the 50's and 60's anyway. My traveling uniform was always shorts, and a short sleeved dress shirt (at least in the summer) and attempting to look as harmless as possible usually resulted in immediate rides. Often my travel times on trips of 200 miles or less was about the same as driving, but much easier on the budget of a college student. Often picked up by elderly people who enjoyed the company.

Hitchhiking today. I never see anybody trying it, except:

1. Stumblebums and vagrants. Or at least they have put effort into creating the image.

2. Snowskiers at the bottom of Loveland pass, Colorado and similar locations. Skis over their shoulders, poles in their hand. If you pick them up and return them to the top you will be entertained with tales of high adventure and open terrain mountain skiing. Surely you have a ski rack on your car, not??

fsskier
 
I've been seeing a number of sign holding beggars over the past couple of years.
The first time I saw any was in the early 'eighties, also a very difficult economic period.
They dried up entirely by the mid 'nineties, when anyone with a pulse and a room temperature IQ could make a decent living in the tight labor market of the time.
 
I still see the odd one, some i would never pick up, others look reasonable but my route only gets them a couple more miles down the highway.
 
Even if I see a nice looking lady hitch hiking I'd be concerned about a guy running up out of the bushes to the car and wanting a ride and/or who knows what else.
 
They were, and still are very common on Oz roads, and I have been know to pick them up...once very memorable, and I went "missing" for three days...another a bloke described how he'd just been released from jail, and was going to another to visit his brother (He was lying at the side of the road...I thought he'd been hit by a coal truck)...others very interesting foreigners backpacking around the country...others just down on their luck and needing to get home.

As a father with children, and with the way the place is going, haven't picked one up for 5 years or so, except from the city boundary to my turn off outside the Max security prison on the way to work.
 
Every Serviceman hitched. College kids. None of this being driven around by Mom stuff. I started hitch hiking in the seventh grade. I hitched every where until I got a car. Then I would drive the car to a parking lot by the highway and hitch hike into U Mass Boston. I used to get rides easily and often had repeaters. This was in the 60's and early seventies. I rarely see them anymore except on the Cape. Darn panhandlers with signs are on just about every major intersection going out or into Boston.

About 1965 , my 14 yr old buddy ran away from home> He got to within 20 miles of his destination in CA and got picked up by the cops. A drunken lady picked him up because she was too drunk to drive. He got picked up because the cops knew the car.
laugh.gif
 
Very rarely. And if I do see one, they usually have that homeless look about them. I do remember seeing all kinds many years ago. Often times it was younger men and women who were looking for a ride.
 
Originally Posted By: fsskier

2. Snowskiers at the bottom of Loveland pass, Colorado and similar locations. Skis over their shoulders, poles in their hand. If you pick them up and return them to the top you will be entertained with tales of high adventure and open terrain mountain skiing. Surely you have a ski rack on your car, not??

fsskier


Weird, I was going through the rte 302 "notch" in northern New Hampshire, 10pm, not a soul around. (Left my car running for a bathroom break on the shoulder-- that desolate.) Mid-winter. Driving, find a mountain climber guy in full gear frantically waving for me to stop. No thanks!

The frantic waving screamed wierdo. The gear said, competent enough to make it through the night. The hitch-hiking said, poor planning.
 
I see it out here from time to time in Washington state. Mostly young folks headed out to hike the Olympics.
 
Originally Posted By: eljefino
It's often "the poors" who pick up hitchhikers, or for that matter, offer jump starts.

Being in need often gives one the perspective required to empathize with others in need. In any event, we do see a few hitchhikers up here. I have helped some in need, since I've been stranded at roadside in the past, and it's not fun in a Saskatchewan winter.
 
Plenty of hitch-hikers in New Zealand - tourists come and backpack around the country. We lose a few, but they still keep coming.
 
I rarely see them in California... Maybe a couple times per year. But in Texas, I saw them very often. Perhaps a few times per week.
 
Yes, with their boyfriends hiding behind a tree so they're more likely to get a ride. Pull over and the guy runs up.
 
Originally Posted By: crinkles
Yes, with their boyfriends hiding behind a tree so they're more likely to get a ride. Pull over and the guy runs up.

Yeah, that'd be just my luck, even if I did spot a Nicole Kidman lookalike at the side of the road.
 
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