REDWOOD CITY, Calif. -- Choking back emotion, the fathers of two young Swedish women who disappeared two weeks ago while hitchhiking along the California coast appealed to the public Thursday to help find their daughters.
Ove Lilienberg and Lars Wahlen, meeting with reporters in a shaded flower garden across the street from the Police Department, pleaded for anyone who might have seen the women to contact authorities.
The men arrived at the Redwood City police station -- the command center of the investigation -- after flying to San Francisco from Sweden Wednesday.
'We will stay here as long as there's any possible chance they are still alive,' Lilienberg said.
Marie Lilienberg, 23, from the Stockholm suburb of Danderyd, was studying in Sweden to be a gymnastics teacher. Maria Wahlen, 24, was a pre-school teacher from Alingsas on the southwest coast of Sweden.
The two women had been on extended vacations in the United States. They met while in Aspen, Colo., and teamed up for the final months of their tour, their fathers said.
Lilienberg, who spoke for both men, said the two women had been warned repeatedly not to hitchhike in the United States.
The women were last seen July 22 when they left a friend's house in Redwood City and headed south to Los Angeles. Police said the women were hitchhiking because they only had $50 left to last until they returned home.
