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Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

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Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#91

Post by Someone »

bedhead wrote: post #19
carlmr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is almost a phenomenon. Europeans have trouble imagining the vastness and untouchedness of American national parks. In Europe almost all hiking trails are close to civilization and well-marked. If you expect the same in America you're in for a surprise.

I just returned from a three week RV trip to some of the national parks out west, including Death Valley. Two of the things I noticed were (1) Europeans outnumbered Americans in the RV parks and (2) Europeans seemed far more inclined to break the national park rules. At one point we were in a guided jeep tour in Canyonlands which is some seriously treacherous driving on cliffside switchbacks. An Escalade sped by us a…

”Europeans outnumbered Americans in the RV parks”

I don’t find that _that_ surprising.

Air travel is dirt-cheap, there are more Europeans than Americans (taking the relatively richer north: Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the UK combined already have 295M. That doesn’t include the 60M Italians, 45M Spaniards, 38M Poles, 10M Portuguese, etc.), Europeans have more holidays, and many of them cannot run out of sick days, so that they don’t have to use their holidays when sick.

I also would _guess_ the lower wealth inequality makes more European than American pensioners wealthy enough to make such a trip.

That’s offset by Americans having a higher average income than Europeans (but income inequality being higher, it wouldn’t surprise me if more Europeans can afford to make the journey), and those parks being closer to where American live than to where Europeans live (but the USA being large and air travel being cheap, I doubt that matters much)

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#92

Post by LorenPechtel »

arethuza wrote: post #42
marvin wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think it’s necessarily a Europe thing, it’s just as likely a tourist thing. When you’re a city-dwelling tourist, you don’t know danger and certainly not the local dangers. Dangers at home are considered part of your upbringing, overgeneralized as absolute facts of the world, while dangers elsewhere are unknown and unexpected. I’ve seen the same in Norway; tourists from all over the world getting lost in the m…

I think its mostly just a "not a local" thing - I've met quite a few people in the Scottish mountains who had got quite a shock at weather conditions even though our hills are tiny compared to the Alps or elsewhere. A 1000m hill can't be dangerous, right?

I will second this. I hike and pretty much I can divide the stupidity into two classes:

1) People who are utterly ill-equipped and know nothing. Almost all of these are within a mile of the trailhead. They are very unlikely to experience worse than an unpleasant time.

2) People who are underequipped and know little of the local situation. These are almost all tourists. (To date I have encountered only one exception--two guys 4 miles and ~2,500' in, water bottles and big, heavy sticks that were worse than useless as trekking poles. Fortunately I got them turned around, had they continued they would have been out of water, risking hypothermia and have had no chance of getting back to civilization before dark--and they had no light.) The ultimate example was a guy from Florida. He was asking me for navigation advice, attempting to reach the highest local summit. It was his 4th attempt, the previous three were blocked by snow. By unreliable reporting there were several feet of snow on the summit at that time, it certainly wasn't considered passable. He was asking me about a third trail shown on his map. Really now, an arrow-straight trail in steep mountains?? That's the boundary line for the ski resort! No GPS, no poles, if he by some miracle summitted he would have had no chance of getting down before nightfall.

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#93

Post by LorenPechtel »

hprotagonist wrote: post #6

Among other reasons, this is why i have a contingency email draft that I have ready to go whenever I go out on a serious-ish hike, along these lines: “here’s who is going, this is our license plate, this is our gear, this is how much food we have, here’s a very rough itinerary; if i don’t update this email by such and such a time, contact the following SAR groups...”

Yup, I leave a dead-tree version with my wife before going out solo, period. And my gear includes a PLB.

If I were doing things where I didn't expect other hikers around I would upgrade that PLB to an inReach.

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#94

Post by LorenPechtel »

latchkey wrote: post #7
hprotagonist wrote: post #6

Among other reasons, this is why i have a contingency email draft that I have ready to go whenever I go out on a serious-ish hike, along these lines: “here’s who is going, this is our license plate, this is our gear, this is how much food we have, here’s a very rough itinerary; if i don’t update this email by such and such a time, contact the following SAR groups...”

My favorite service for this: https://www.deadmansswitch.net

Useless for backcountry safety, it won't trigger for way too long. Off the top of my head there are two apps that are actually useful: Cairn and I believe AllTrails has just added such capability. You can set a notification that will be delivered at a certain time if you don't check in with it. Cairn's capability on Android I find quite limited, I haven't tried AllTrails.

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#95

Post by LorenPechtel »

Rebelgecko wrote: post #84
DenisM wrote: post #83

It surprises me that people can’t bring a PLB along when going to a non-trivial hike. It’s only $300 and it can transmit SOS both to low orbit satellites and to rescue copters, and it has shelf life of five years (no need to charge).

I think the monthly subscription fees are a turnoff to some people (although I think there are a few brands now that don't require that)

PLBs have no subscription. You must register them with the government but it's free. And mine only cost $250--watch prices on Amazon to get a better deal.

What you are thinking of are the SPOT & inReach units--those have subscription fees but provide you text messaging while off the grid. PLBs are single-shot HELP messages, they can't be customized. (Are you simply stranded like these guys, non-threatening injury that keeps you from getting yourself out, or is it a major issue--say, the guy here last year that keeled over on top of Hell Hill. It probably wouldn't have made a difference but the hour it took to get help certainly wasn't good.)

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#96

Post by ahi »

senorjazz wrote: post #70
jseutter wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From reading http://theory.stanford.edu/~rvg/arroyo/ (warning: nudity) linked from the ropewiki page, when hiking from the top, this journey is a combination of hiking, wading along the river and floating down it. It sounds like lots of fun. Turning around at the waterfall means that they would have to hike back as well as swim upstream, possibly through rapids, to get back to their starting point. It could be next t…

> It could be next to impossible. Do you know this of assumed? Sounds difficult for sure, but is it possible? I mean, if you had no way forward and had two options: 1) turn around 2) throw a bottle into the waterfall and hope I would turn around (unless as you said, is actually impossible, but I haven't been able to find anything definitive on this)

This wasn't the most robust crew. They were at a local minimum, both topographically and risk. They were safe where they were for at least a few days. Hiking out might have been beyond their ability. Having read some stories of people who didnt get out of these situations, it's not usually the first mistake that does it. It's the process of trying to get out that results in digging a bigger hole. I think they made the right call to abort rather than increase the risk.

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#97

Post by Apocryphon »

gardnerbickford wrote: post #23

I don't mean to be rude but: why is this here? It would be a neat project to map out the changes in the types of stories and comments on HN over time. Over the years, HN has grown more and more in the direction of reddit front page and become less and less like an irc channel where people talk about technology.

This family hacked a terrible situation and innovated a workaround that led to a satisfactory exit.

Re: Two California hikers found a family's message in a bottle and helped save them

#99

Post by henvic »

carlmr wrote: post #18
sizzzzlerz wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a fascinating story and the persistance of the author in trying to find the family is remarkable but its totally different than this story. The Germans were completely unprepared for their adventure without the correct clothing, not enough water, and apparently little or no knowledge of where they were going or where they were. The family in this story were prepared, knew exactly where they were going and where…

I think this is almost a phenomenon. Europeans have trouble imagining the vastness and untouchedness of American national parks. In Europe almost all hiking trails are close to civilization and well-marked. If you expect the same in America you're in for a surprise.

Four years ago, I made a huge mistake that maybe almost costed my life. I went to California's Palm Desert desert - the weather was about 125ºF. I went out walking, unprepared.

It was one of my first experience outdoors in the wild and pristine nature (besides some guided visits to Brazilian forests I guess). The only other meaningful experience back then was going to major attractions in Yosemite a couple of days before.

I dropped off a friend at Palm Springs airport as she had to go back to her life in NYC earlier, and continued the trip by myself. Afterward driving for a little bit, I arrived in a spot in Joshua Tree where the parking lot closes during the summer, and you have to park along the road, but there were quite a few people out there.

There were two trails at that spot. One was close, but the other was far away. I made the first quite fast. There was an oasis there — a wonderful place. I figured [wrongly] that I could make the second trail as well. The trail signs didn't indicate that the second was quite far away. Something like 5mi, I guess. Also, there was a small sign saying the trail was closed due to hazard conditions (heat). I missed it and only saw it on my way back (the sign was not in place due to wind... I guess).

I had bought plenty of water but was stupid enough to leave it in the car and started walking the second trail.

I always knew where I was. I wasn't lost at all. However, it was really hot, and I was afraid I'd pass out anytime after a while, and decided it was time to head back. I believed I could return to safety really fast, as the trail seemed to be almost parallel to the road I parked my car, but there were large rock fragments, and I couldn't safely reach the road. I almost became desperate and started crying a little thinking I was minutes away from death. There weren't even any bushes to protect me from the elements. I tried to call 911 to share my location and ask them to send someone over if I pass out or don't return their call soon, but it was to no avail as there was no cellphone coverage.

Once I finally found a spot I could safely climb, I did so and started walking in the side of the road as I wanted to be seen by anyone, in case I collapsed. A car passed by me as I was 100m away from mine. I decided not to bother. I regret it.

I spent a whole day recovering in the hotel room afterwards.

Looking in retrospective, I should have never gone on a hike without knowing exactly what would be expected and with no water. If I ever go out to the middle of nowhere, I'm bringing a radio, satellite phone, or both. Plus, letting someone else know about my plans and location.

In the afternoon of the following day, I went to Joshua Tree, and got lost-ish just after sunset. But I was better preppared and found my way back in 10min. Still, it was something I regret a lot. Here is how I found myself: my Sony Experia GPS app failed on me (now, thankfully back to the iPhone), and I couldn't see anyone anymore... so I grabbed my MacBook Pro, fired Lightroom, imported a photo of the parking lot I took with the camera, saw the GPS coordinates, and used my Canon 6D camera as a GPS unit (I'd walk trying to find my latitude, then my longitude, until I got it right - this all while opening/closing the embedded GPS debugging tool that doesn't update the location automatically)...

I'm usually not reckless with anything, and these were exceptions in my whole life. I have revisited them, and some other dangerous places, and I always do my best to keep safe - after these experiences safer than most, perhaps.

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