I brought a family-pack of walkie-talkies for my wife and my two teenage boys to use while we were hiking around various Austrian mountains, one summer vacation.

We rarely used them much, since we were often walking in a family unit, so during one of our breaks I took one out, turned it on, and blasted off into the ether "hello hello, anyone out there wanna chat?" .. did this off and on for the afternoon, when suddenly, a voice answered back "yes! who is this?" ..

A family waaaaay the hell down the mountain rage, deep in the valley, had by chance heard my call .. so the boys spent the afternoon getting to know all of the 5 kids in that family that were all drawn to the conversation.

It was awesome, for the rest of the week, our kids and theirs just chatted away .. what had started out to be, a little bit of a mundane trip for the kids, turned out to be a hilarious social experience.

We call for them every time we're out that way - never met them, but for the past 3 years, the conversations have continued and it has been a great alternative to the mobile phones we have been troubled with up in the cabin, at times.