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You drove into the Big Californian Valley in a car with BASE licence plates, USPA bumper stickers, photos of big wall jumps from Norway, Italy, Switzerland etc scattered over the back seat and with one of those little rig style backpacks on.

I'm assuming the Rangers would search the vehicle but they find not so much as a pull up cord or patch of F111.

So what do you think they might do - let you go, throw you out of the park, take your details, arrest you for intent?

 

Oh hell no I'm not thinking of doing it (nor suggesting anyone should). It is a completely hypothetical scenario.

I'm just curious what people think the extent of NPS prejudice against BASE jumpers is, and what treatment someone could expect if they identified themselves as a jumper while at the same time having absolutely no equipment and giving no reason to believe that they are going to jump while in the park.

They say the US is the land of the free. That your innocent until proven guilty. Well if you believe that crap you have never been touched by the law. Just walking from your front door of your car on the street you are supposed to aware of over 1400 laws. "Ignorance of the law is no excuse" Judge Roy Bean. The truth is you can be arrested and charged for anything if you can't post bale there you stay until you go to court. Arrested on Friday, Monday is a holiday, you go to court on Wednesday. That's 6 days, in court they ask if you can afford a lawyer if not one will be appointed and a new court date is set in 3 days. The nightmare goes on for months. If it takes over 30 days to get out what happens to your stuff? You apartment all the things in it. Your car can be sold from impound in 30 days. This is just a small part of the American justice system. Once they have you they don't want to let you go. Except for money, if you have lots of money things are different. Don't be fooled by the smiles Park rangers are the lowest form of law enforcement and they hate BASE jumpers be very careful in our national parks. The NPS slogan is "come on vacation and leave on probation"

In all honesty?

90% of the time they wouldn't even blink. I once got pulled over in the park, with 2 unpacked rigs in stash bags, and one packed rig not in a bag, all on the back seat. The rangers thought we were smoking pot or something, hassled us for a while, and then let us go.

I think a lot of jumpers overestimate how aggressive the NPS is about chasing us. Once you're busted, it's a different story, but in recent years the amount of full on harassment hasn't been too out of control.

Damn that sounds like it was a fun day.

Thanks for the answer, it was just on of those idle thoughts bouncing round my head.