17 Hiking Trips That Turned Into a Comedy

Hiking in the mountains, barbecue and camping are unforgettable leisure activities where you can have fun with friends and also feel yourself a part of the wilderness. The heroes of this article got into a variety of adventures. Someone met his ex-girlfriend on a hike after 15 years, and someone else even managed to make friends with a raccoon.

• Not long ago I mentioned to a friend that my dad has a boat and we could go spend some time on the islands. She got all excited and asked me to take her and her friends. Fine, I arranged it with my dad.
  Nobody said a word about gas money or anything else — she’s my friend, after all. So we went to the island, everything was great, my dad and I swam a bit and headed back after enjoying some barbecue. Her group stayed overnight in tents.
  The next day we picked them up. And then, a couple of days later, my friend actually asked me to pay for the barbecue that they had “treated” us to. © Overheard / Ideer
• We were out at the lake at the end of May. Still a little chilly for this area, but the day turned out sunny. Forest, beauty, pines, boulders, that ringing silence.
  I lay down on a huge mossy boulder, sun in my eyes, just soaking it in, smiling, with no one to share the feeling with. I turn my head, and on the next boulder there’s a huge viper basking with the exact same blissful expression on its “face.”
  We looked at each other. It slithered away, and I slid off my rock, trying to calm my racing heart. That’s nature for you. © Overheard / Ideer
• I summited a peak (Cadair Idris, Snowdonia) to find the world’s boldest sheep mugging other people at the top. Anyone who has hiked around livestock knows they’re usually skittish or just ignore you.
  This ewe and her lamb were legit going up to people and taking the food out of their hands. She stole a scotch egg, a packet of crisps, an entire apple and my (unopened) snack bar. She would have had my sandwich too if I wasn’t on guard.
  Meanwhile, her lamb chased a seagull about. Snapped a selfie with her before descending. © Expression-Little / Reddit

• We went out into the woods with some friends, you know, grill, meat, guitar. I decided to take a bathroom break. Found a spot a little farther away, and then I hear a voice, “Hello, forest service. What’s going on here?”
  I almost had a heart attack. And the guy calmly goes, “You should probably move a bit further because we set up a camera here recently to film wild boars, and you are standing right in front of it.” I almost went gray right there.
  Later I told my friends about it, and they laughed at me for 3 days straight. © Not everyone will understand / VK
• We went camping with some friends, but the whole thing got ruined because one of them got bitten by a tick. He freaked out and said we needed to go to the hospital. We tried to take the tick off, but he wouldn’t let us, you know, private area. So we called the hike off.
  Later, he comes out of the doctor’s office laughing. We ask, “Did they get it out?” And he goes, “The doctor said I should shower more often!” Some dirt had stuck to his leg. © Overheard / Ideer
• My husband and his brother decided to take the kids on a camping trip in the woods. Overnight in tents, food on the campfire, fishing, the lake. They said they would teach the kids how to survive in the forest and what to do in emergencies.
  “My little survivalists” came back that same evening. They somehow managed to break the tent while setting it up, didn’t get the fire going because the branches were wet, and the “lesson” didn’t happen at all. My husband and his brother were tired and annoyed, but the kids loved it, they got to swim in the lake. © Mamdarinka / VK

• When I was 5 years old, my family would go for hikes. I would run up ahead and then hide behind a rock or a tree and jump out to ’scare’ my parents. I’m sure you can already see where this is going.
  So, I run up ahead. Next to the trail is a small bump and on top of the bump is a tree. So I go up the bump and hide behind the tree. I hear my family approaching.
  Right when they are almost there, I jump out to ’scare’ them. Except it isn’t my family, it is someone else.
  So I try to stop by grabbing onto a branch of the tree. I hold on and flip upside down, so now I’m hanging upside down from a tree in front of a couple strangers. I was very embarrassed, but everyone else got a good laugh. © ignorantwanderer / Reddit
• My funniest is every time I think I’m going strong while huffing and puffing a vertical climb in Korea, some 80-year-old Korean person goes casually strolling right past me at twice my pace like it is the easiest walk in the world. © freddythedinosaur1 / Reddit
• I was solo hiking and ran into a woman I dated 15 years ago who was also solo hiking, and it was like 7 miles from any trailhead. That was more awkward than funny but definitely funny in a small world kind of way. © psparks / Reddit

• Was hiking with my wife in Zion when we reached a particularly narrow passage. As we got to the mid-point, we see this other couple coming from the other direction towards us.
  When they finally got to us, we tried to go flat against the wall so that they could pass by and as they did, my stomach let out a mighty gurgle/roar (we were aiming to get lunch once we were done). The woman passing us seized up, grabbed her husband, and whispered frantically, “Honey, I think I heard a mountain lion!”
  I meekly apologized and told her that I was just hungry and that my belly was throwing its voice. We all had a good laugh at my belly’s expense immediately afterwards. © blahdre / Reddit
• I was on a hiking trip in Canada when I found out after 3 years together that my boyfriend at the time was afraid of horses. We were staying in Jasper and decided to go on a hike near this lake. It was a beautiful spot that was also a trail that was used for horseback riding.
  So we’re going along, and we see a line of people up ahead on horseback being led on a tour, and my boyfriend was like, “Let’s pull off the trail for a minute.” And I’m like, “Great idea, I’m getting kinda hungry anyway.” So we pull maybe 10 yards off trail and I proceed to pull out a bag of baby carrots I’d gotten from the supermarket.
  Well, one whiff of those carrots as the group passed and one horse was like, “Oh yeah, carrots,” and veered off the path directly for us. Proceed boyfriend screeching like a little girl and running away and the lady on horseback apologizing profusely about the horse she could not control as it all but bowled me over trying to get to these carrots.
  The whole thing to me was hilarious. Not so much for my boyfriend, who made me wait like 5 minutes after the horses left and then go back to where he was further in the forest before getting the carrots back out again. © Lady_Ange / Reddit

• My most impulsive move was going on a mountain trip with a guy I had known for only a day. Just because I felt like it.
  Yeah, it was a little scary, but I was too tired of all the routine to protest. I’ve long realized that even with close people, it can be hard to spend the whole day alone together, but not with him.
  It was simply unforgettable. We walked, joked, laughed, talked about everything, relaxed, cooked over the fire, and swam in the waterfall. The whole time, I never even thought that I didn’t really know him, that’s how well we understood each other.
  And now, a year later, we’re best friends. The moral is: don’t be afraid to let people into your life. Yes, many will come and go, leaving a scar on your heart, but it’s worth taking the risk for the ones who stay. © Ward 6 | Stories Anonymous / Telegram
• Not long ago, I went camping. Early in the morning, I crawled out of the tent and saw a raccoon standing there. I grabbed a cookie and decided to offer it to it.
  I held it out and called the little guy over, like, “Here, have some.” It ran up, grabbed the cookie, took our kettle, and ran off into the woods. The kettle wasn’t a big deal, we could heat water in a pot anyway.
  But what really got me thinking is, why did it run off? I would’ve poured it some tea right there. Or maybe it just likes drinking tea at home, munching on the cookie, and thinking about how cleverly it tricked a human? © Ward 6 | Stories Anonymous / Telegram

• Recently, I went camping with some friends. They have 2 kids. At first, the kids were busy with their gadgets, then they got tired of climbing rocks and started paying attention to me.
  I was reading Warrior Cats on my tablet and offered to read it to them. Who would have thought you could keep modern kids entertained for 3 whole days just by reading a story out loud? © Ward 6 | Stories Anonymous / Telegram
• I’ll remember this camping trip for the rest of my life. We were grilling kebabs and sausages. Everything seemed pretty normal.
  Suddenly, my boyfriend started handing out the skewers, and when it was my turn, he handed me the grilled sausages. I stared at them for a few seconds in complete surprise.
  Then I screamed and threw my arms around him. It turned out there was a ring on one of the sausages. And now I’m engaged. © Ward 6 | Anonymous Stories / Telegram

• Many years ago, my mom and I were hiking with her 35-pound wheaten terrier in the East coast of the US. It was evening.
  Suddenly, the dog took off like a madwoman, and we saw the full-grown adult black bear she was chasing. This sweet and gentle dog without a single menacing bone in her body chased a bear up a tree. I couldn’t compose myself enough to recall the dog!! © MeanSecurity / Reddit
• A couple friends and I were sitting on top of a mountain after spending a good part of the day hiking it in our late twenties. We get the bright idea to race down the mountain.
  So we’re jogging/running down the trail and come around a corner, there’s a family hiking up the trail about 70 yards down the trail from us. The father gets a look of pure terror and just starts screaming... BEAR!? BEAR?!
  I yell nope, just a race between friends. As we pass them and keep running, the father is screaming and swearing at us for terrorizing his children as they faded out in the distance. They had all looked fine until he started screaming bear in a panic. © lostalaska / Reddit

After these comical stories, we just want to go to nature, stay in tents for a while, enjoy a tasty kebab and songs by the fire. Oh, this camping romance! The best part is that a trip to the countryside can be enjoyable not only with friends, but also alone. It’s a great way to unwind and reset your mind.

And these camping trips started peacefully, but ended wildly wrong.