[Will Hunt]

Me and a friend are hitching to a place near Malaga to clip bolts for a few weeks (flying back though).

Is anyone able to give us a lift from the Leeds area to as far South as possible on this day. I think we are heading for Folkestone in England.

We wont smell at this point and will be able to provide much banter.

[andy_e]

Are you and sean going to the Chorro? lucky barstewards.

[Will Hunt]

Sean and a load of others are flying out on the Monday after but £80 in flights is a bit much so we opted to get out there for free and then fly back when we're knackered. Me and Dave are hitching.

[lagerstarfish]

£80 in flights is a bit much

By how much is £80 too much for a flight that will save you a hitching journey of 1600 miles? I am sure you could find a couple of days casual work which will pay more than £80/x per hour, where x is the number of hours likley to be spent hitching to malaga minus hours taken by the flight. 

[Will Hunt]

Well a greater factor than the cost is that it should be a good laugh. Plus Ive never done a long distance hitch before. Furthest Ive been is Leeds to Blencathra and we cheated a bit on that. Decided to meet at the Parkinson Steps (main meeting place in Leeds Uni) and found that an environmental sciences fieldtrip was gathering to go on a field trip to Blencathra by conincidence. We weasled our way onto the bus with them and were there in no time 

[dave smith]

Yeah, exactly. It's going to be a laugh, we'll meet some fun people I hope! Hardest bit will be getting out of Leeds, I should think! Anyone heading down the M1/M20 on Saturday, a lift would be hugely appreciated!

[lagerstarfish]

Well a greater factor than the cost is that it should be a good laugh. Plus Ive never done a long distance hitch before.

Sound logic. Can't fault you. 

[robertostallioni]

Apologies in advance for the negative post, but I am struggling to stop the left to right motion of my head. As I get older there are many things that occur where I think, fuck me, ten years ago I would have done that myself, but now I have obviously shifted my 'good sense' parameters. Never though would I have forgone holiday climbing time to spend a (un)healthy portion of my trip travelling with a sweating trucker hiding an erection. Or standing at roundabouts/service stations/interchanges. There are some experiences that are simply not worth having. I suggest this is one of them. Borrow the £80. Or lets face it, just get it out of your account.....

[Houdini]

Listen to the Stallion, William.


A good and incredibly big, strong, man bitch of a man-friend of mine onetime had to fend off the unrequited pangs of a one-armed bum bandit (schweet) onetime thumbing it, on the road.

There's a gravel pit pond down the road I used to swim at as a boy etc..  Fuck it.  2 days of your life is worth more than €120.

[Will Hunt]

Probably a bit of back ground info required. We are meeting a group of friends there and staying in a house owned by the father of one of he group. Sean, for that is the name of the keeper of the keys, and the rest of the gang are flying out on the Monday so probably wont hit the rock till Tuesday as they need to get the hire car etc.

Me and Dave are leaving on the Saturday so provided we get there before Tuesday we wont miss any climbing time, will have £40 extra for beer, a sounder conscience environmentally speaking, an adventure under our belts and will have a few good stories to tell as well as having completed one of the many "rites of passage" for climbers.

As for the bum rape I'll leave that to Dave. He's a one with the ladies so why not the men as well? Much more his scene and he's got those coy "come to bed" eyes down to a tee.

[dave smith]

I'll thank you not to insinuate that kind of thing Will, just because you're jealous that I occasionally get some! As for hitching, I dunno, I've done a fair bit in Mexico and around England, and whilst you get the occasional grumpy bastard, most people are just interested or generous. Forgive me for not being a cynical sod!

[grumpycrumpy]

Go for it Will .... Hitching on the continent is much more fun .....

[robertostallioni]

You're not going to believe this Will, but I have just spent the last half an hour on Homohitchers.co.uk/forums and there is a DHL International Driver of all things on there suggesting that he is to travel down to Andalucia to experience a weeks sportclimbing to provide stories to tell to his back door trucker mates. He is literally looking for an adventure "under his belt" and "rites of THE passage". Unbelievable.
Hope this thought provides a little light at the end of your tunnel as you grasp Daves hand, both shivering in the dark in a brown cloth sack, waiting for the 'friendly talkative chap' to return, with his mates.

You have him first, then I'll break him in.

Yeehah.

think on

Stallion.

[Houdini]

Ride 'em, Pilgrim...

[Will Hunt]

Well at least we'll make it nice and easy for them as we shall be carrying our own rope.

[robertostallioni]

Id take some "climb on". If it's gonna happen it's gonna happen. Don't lets make things harder than they need be.

[Jaspersharpe]

Me and Simon Scully once decided to hitch out to Cheedale to do Powerplant. It took us about five hours (and we'd got a lift to Fox House so only had to start hitching from there). The various lifts included a flower van driven by two mad women and a bus that we had to flag down when we'd resigned ouselves that we were walking the rest of the way from Litton. By the time we got there we were so knackered that we only managed one attempt each before fortunately bumping into Rich Heap and getting a lift back to Sheffield. It sounds quite amusing when written down. It wasn't. NEVER AGAIN!

I have no experience of hitching abroad but I do know plenty of people who have done it. The stories of being robbed / flashed at etc that they told were enough to persuade me that it wasn't the best idea.

The "rites of passage" thing. Climbers haven't generally hitched places because they wanted to. It was because they were skint and there was no such thing as Easyjet.

This is not to say that you wont have a great time and I hope you do. 

[webbo]

i have hitched down to verdon and elsewhere in france on a couple of occasions. although it makes a good story now there were times when i'd rather have been sticking pins in my eyes.
getting dropped off on the wrong side of town and having to walk miles to find somewhere to start hitching again,waiting 5 hours for a lift,taking 10 hours to get 30 miles and the joy of finally getting a lift only to climb in the cab to see the driver sat in his under wear.

[grumpycrumpy]

I always had great experiences hitching round Europe ..... Only strange thing that happened was getting a lift with two one-legged men .....

[adam p]

Many years ago I hitched from Melbourne back to Arapiles where I was living in the dirt for a few months (those were the days!) and got a lift with some mad dude in a ute. His girlfriend had dumped him and run off to Alice Springs. He was chasing after her, determined to make up the 18 hour head start she had by driving like a demon - aided I'm sure by a hefty nostril or two of speed or summat similar!

Nice enough guy, but f*cking scary driver! And still remember the mad Jack Russell I had to share my seat with....anyway mad dude certainly made up some time and I got to Araps by sundown, though I was very glad to wave him goodbye after several very worrying roundabout manouevres...

Many good memories from that trip....today, I'd deffo pay the £80 and fly to Chorro!

Whatever you do, have a great one!

[Will Hunt]

It seems that theres a university water polo team on their way to Spain on Saturday! Apparently many of them are female and many of them are what might be described as "fillys". This could turn out to be a cool trip.

[Jaspersharpe]

It seems that theres a university water polo team on their way to Spain on Saturday! Apparently many of them are female and many of them are what might be described as "fillys". This could turn out to be a cool trip.

Are you at Footlights College, Oxbridge Will?

"Rah rah rah. We're going to smash the oiks!"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0752252/



 

[Will Hunt]

The amount of Ras at Leeds is very disproportionate to latitude.

[SA Chris]

Possibly on surpassed by Durham. Oh, and St Andrew's.

Will, just checking, you are aware that El Chorro is a fair distance from Malaga? Will you have access to a car once you are there?

[dave smith]

Yeah we know, we're actually staying with a mate about an hour or so north of Malaga, and he has transport. We'll be pretty close to climbing by the time we're there, it's just that Malaga is the nearest recognisable place. Good job I speak Spanish too, I should think that by the time we get that far off the beaten track, there will be a lot fewer people speaking English!