Greek Tourist Dies Falling Off of Horseshoe Bend in Page, Az.

read it here.

It's mind boggling how people travel to these locations and don't pay attention. I noticed that at the Grand Canyon with folks ignoring warning signs and crossing on loose rock areas on the Bright Angel trail to take snapshots for Aunt Frida, or hiking in flip flops.

I saw it extensively in the Smokies on steep mountain climbs last week. Folks hiking to the waterfalls in flip flops and one guy barefoot. Saw another nosepicker ignore the signs and got very close to a large elk buck and started making mating calls to it. Or folks trying to get snapshots of a bear with their sony P&S cameras.

I'm just amazed that these folks don't understand that they could get seriously hurt or get killed due to their eating crap in these mountain locations.

I've been close to the edge of horseshoe bend to photograph it and I've been extremely cautious making sure both my gear and my person is safe. Yet I've seen folks there, mainly young tourists sun bathing close to the edge of the cliffs.

Unreal!

When I was at Glacier N.P. last year I saw a young man hike all the way up to Iceberg Lake (10 mile round trip) in flip-flops, the last mile at the top being in snow. He didn't seem any the worse for wear but I was still shocked.

DB

While in Grand Canyon about 2 years ago we also saw some nutty people hiking in flip flops and climbing fences to get to rock outcroppings for pictures of themselves and friends with P&S cameras. Signs all over telling people how dangerous it is but they happily ignore them! Unbelievable!!!:2eyes2:

I'm sure there will be some Darwin award winners coming out of the parks !!!

More then once I have seen tourist pose their children next to Alligators at Shark Valley for pictures, I had a conversation with a ranger one day and she told me the parents get upset and argue when they receive a ticket for harassing the gators.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Alfred Forns

I'm sure there will be some Darwin award winners coming out of the parks !!!

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And some of these folks have native intelligence, they just choose not to use it. One of my relatives, a guy with an IQ (not image quality) over 140 ignored the sign at Linville Falls in North Carolina, stepped out into the flowing water, slipped on the mossy rocks, and fell very hard. Fortunately he recovered before sliding over the falls and the only real damage, other than to my heart, was the loss of his camera.

I was just there and that drop (the lower falls) is a doozy.