Yeah, last time was a young-ish lady 'bout three years ago, and when I’d stopped for her two or three of her younger brothers popped up and she asked if they could come too. I was cool with that - a coward dies a thousand deaths - but I’d also have been cool if they’d all been waiting obviously together too. Don’t often see 'em and the last time I did I was on the bike, so I gave him a one-armed “sorry mate, can’t help you” shrug as I went past. (UK has a mandatory helmet law.)
Yes. They were not a total stranger. They worked where I did, but I didn’t do anything with them at work.
Once, in the middle of the massive snowstorm that blanketed the area a few years ago. The busses didn’t have chains so everyone and their dog were stranded at work. Lots of employees wound up thumbing it, and I felt safe enough with taking 3 complete strangers across the bridge because we all worked for the same company.
That’s about the only time I’ve ever picked up a hitchhiker.
Once. A woman was hitchhiking in town, and when I pulled over, she begged me to take her to the hospital, as her dad was ill. Well, we have buses and stuff, but I took her - dropped her off at the local hospital. I hope her Dad did OK.
Question - has anyone stopped to pick up a hitchhiker and then been so skeeved (or whatever) by them that you changed your mind? Maybe they were holding an axe or something. Did you tell them or just drive offf and leave them in the dust?
Back in 1970 two young women were picked up on the campus of West Virginia University, where they were hitchhiking. It was pretty commonly done back then to get between the two campuses. Their beheaded bodies were found later, about 15 miles away.
This could have had something to do with it.
On St. John, USVI, it’s fairly common. I’ve both hitched and picked up people there. But it’s a small island and pretty safe.
Yes, but in a not terribly threatening situation. The hitchhiker was a petit 20-something girl with a heavy backpack walking near graduate student housing in broad daylight in an urban setting. She said she wanted to get to the train station a few miles away. In the car already: me and my friend, both male, with a combined height of 12’3" and a combined weight of 380 lbs.
Seemed fairly safe from our end…
Yes, but why did she get in?
I wonder just how dangerous it really is. Is mostly safe, but we’ve all gotten into hysterics about the danger because of a handful of highly publicized whackos? Was it once safe, but now that we’ve been so thoroughly conditioned to believe it’s dangerous, that only whackos would do it, so now it actually *is *dangerous?
Child, that was probably the least dangerous thing I did while living in Cali. shakes head
Orson Welles did a radio show episode titled “The Hitchhiker” years ago. I have heard the Suspense episode, but I don’t really remember the plot beyond the existence of a creepy hitchhiker. I found a website that stay it was about a supernatural hitchhiker who follows him across the country. According to the site, he first performed the part on his show Mercury Theatre on the Air in 1941. He reprised the role for an episode of Suspense in 1942. The story was later adapted for an episode of The Twilight Zone on television. Originating in 1941, this is a pretty early example. I don’t know that it was the origin of the meme, but having been on both Suspense and The Twilight Zone, I suspect it went a long way in perpetuating it.
I put in something over 100,000 miles over about fifteen years hitch-hiking around the U.S. and Canada in the 70s and 80s. I was robbed twice, and only felt in danger of my life twice.
When I started there were hitch-hikers everywhere; by the time I stopped, we were few and far between. By the time I got a car, hitch-hikers were even rarer. I think I’ve picked up one on a road trip. (Many more on roads between local towns.)
Last week I drove from St. Louis to Denver and back, and did not see a single hitch-hiker. (I did see a guy with a backpack walking along Rt. 50 east of La Junta, no sign that he wanted a ride, though.)
Many years ago, I lived in Santa Cruz, CA; I had shoulder length hair and drove a day-glo yellow VW bus. Yes, I picked up hitch hikers
That would be the opposite meme–the psycho-who-picks-up-hitchhikers.
I might have mentioned this before, but about 7 years ago I was in Tasmania. I had a hire car, and I was just leaving the small coastal town where I’d stopped overnight. A man was at the side of the road with a backpack and thunbed for a lift. I recognised him as a guy who had been juggling fire clubs outside a bar on the beach the night before and I thought he might be an interesting character.
So he got in (the back seat for some reason, I don’t remember why) and we were chatting as best we could, which was not too well as the exhaust pipe had fallen off my rental car a few days before and it was pretty noisy. He said he couldn’t drive because “they took my licence off me”. “Oh, why’s that? Been speeding?” I asked. “No, it’s these drugs I’m on.”
It turned out he wanted dropping off at the Burnie Mental Health Institute where he had to get his regular injection of antipsychotic medication. I didn’t pick up any more hitchhikers on that trip.
It sounds like he was behaving completely responsibly. What was your problem?
From time to time I still pick up hitchhikers. It’s typically just some guy with a bad-luck story trying to get somewhere. I haven’t been killed: yet.
I pick people up on the way to work - the bus service is non-existent on a certain stretch of road - or from work, on Sundays, in work clothes. I feel like I’m getting more for my gas money. Unfortunately a few years ago I picked up a security guard going home from work - in his uniform - and he made a pass at me. I stopped the car, told him to get out and later called the company, but I didn’t have his name so the boss said he would mention it in a general meeting. We are in a small rural place and we pretty much know each other. That security guard was not a native, I was really disappointed and didn’t pick anyone up for quite a while. Here we don’t carry on a conversation with the hiker, they just sit there politely - it’s never a long distance anyway.
Every time I pass some innocent bloke thumbing a ride home I think of that bloody security guard and how his one sentence slowed down the whole show.
My longest wait for a ride was outside Bordeaux - 23 hours. My longest straight ride was from Athens to the Dutch border. Avignon to Paris was a good one too.
The safest way to pick up a hitchhiker is by their dirty, long hair — goddamn hippie degenerates. Get off my highway!
I’ve picked up hitchhikers and been one but not so much lately - they tend to be a lot fewer in numbers around here now and the ones out there look like refugees from the Hog Farm. I still will pick them up on the motorcycle; but those cloth car seats are Hell for stains.
As an invulnerable teenager I both hitchhiked and picked up hitchhikers but it’s been quite a few years since I’ve done so. I would never let my kids hitchhike when they were in that age range. I don’t remember any particularly scary moments, I just eventually decided that a female driving alone and picking up hitchhikers probably wasn’t the smartest decision in the world.