Skoolie Traveling 101: the fuzz,etc??? Opinions welcom!

[telluriders]

Hello all!
In june, myself and my long time (best!!) friend will be shuttling 7 former high school friends from NC to Telluride's annual Bluegrass festival in Colorado! A journey indeed! As we continue with our rennovation of our "Telluriders" bus, i had a few travel questions to adress and was hoping some of you could offer some advice.

First off,how succeptable are skoolies to being pulled over by the fuzz? I mean we wont be cheech & chonging it, but im sure a few of our friends will be putting back some brew. My concern with being pulled over, is that the cop may decide to search it, but i imagine searching a skoolie (plus the amount of gear we will be hauling) will take a considerable amount of time; time we cannot afford as we have a strict intinerary to make it to the fest a few days ahead of time. Plus, i do not want to be the road side spectacle on the side on some busy interstate for two hours.
So, i was wondering (if skoolies are indeed suspicious to the 5.0), if there were some things we could do to lessen the chane of being annoyed by the cops such as traveling more at night, taking only interstates, etc. On a side note, my boss suggested putting some vinyl lettering on the sides of the bus that read "Park Street United Methodist Church Youth Group." Good idea right? Perhaps not?

Secondly, once we have decided to stop for a night and we choose a Walmart parking lot, how "snoopy" are the cops to a bus with sleeping passangers? That is the last thing i want to be woken up to after being on the road for 12 hours!!

So if anyone has any suggestions or even their own encounters, please throw them out there!!!
Thanks!!!

[bansil]

just remember if it's illegal...it's illegal no matter what.
as for drinking ...too many laws and variables

Some places if you are in your "home" and not in the drivers area;open containers are ok(this depends on the law,interpetation by LEO etc.)in some locals any open beverage in the vehicle is illegal

make sure of the law where your at before spouting off "this is my home, you'll need a search warrant to look around" I have heard from friends this can and will back fire 99% of the time luckly their stories had funny and no jail time endings...one was "oh so your "home" is trespassing on private property?" ...ended ok tho'

Like I said thats alot of of variables between here and there....don't do anything to get pulled over and you should be be fine,if there is anything "suspect" and you get pulled over, makes sure everything is good to go and you'll be fine...the first friend that says something stupid,will be the one to get everyone arrested.

Yes you are inocent until being proven guilty,this could be after the bus has been towed,impounded(for safe keeping of your goods) and you have seen the judge the next morning.

I would just drive and then relax after your done driving.

and that brings up another thing....public intoxication...yup! if your being loud and making a scene at the wally world...guess what?jail

The local LEO's and people may not like some out of towners coming in and disrupting there "home"

all it takes is someone walking in the parking lot and saying to an employee "theres some people out in the parking lot smoking,drinking and being rowdy"...guess what?Local LEO's will show up

Good luck and post your story and pics when you get bak...have fun and just be smart and safe

[chev49]

mostly normal looking skoolies won't get pulled over by the cops if they are being driven in a reasonable manner like not speeding and weaving all over the place. They probably will if all the girls are flashing their boobs at the cop sitting by the road.

[telluriders]

Bansil:
Thanks for your input. Interesting to hear that a friend used the same argument i was planning on using , but i understand what your're saying. On the flip side, you can hide a lot of things in the amount of time it takes the officer to walk from his car,the length of the bus, to the doors I would prefer to stay somewhere else as opposed to a parking lot...but it is FREE. Ive never stayed at an rv park for a night, are their rates for a night pretty reasonable (presumming we find a pretty hum-dum park.)

and yes!!! ive got some pictures from the past few weeks that we need to get up on here!!

chev49:
Yeah that is what i thought, so i was wondering if we could get by with "North Carolina HOG Hunters" along the side (as our music fest group name is the Hogs, passed down from our parents) and possible put "telluriders" on the arch in the back where it normally says school bus??
Thanks for your advice!

Also, does anyone if it is truly unlawful to block up the back windows??

[chev49]

If you watched UK's "top Gear" program when they started in florida and drove their cars to new orleans, you would realize that some states like Alabama don't like certain slogans painted in large pink letters on your car or pickup... In fact, when they got to the first station in alabama, the woman owner called her "boys" and pick up trucks showed up and started throwing rocks, and way more.. soon jeramy, et all, got off the freeway and rapidly cleaned up their cars...

So i assume it might matter what you have on the side of your bus, and gender suggestions... esp in Alabama.

(I keep a low profile cause my wife has a fam there...) College decals for whaever your state you cross into are a big help.. hint hint.

[RavensOracle]

The best advice I can give is-

"Don't mess with my life, I won't mess with yours."

What I mean by that is most people won't give a damn about you travelling unless you are interfering with them in some way. If you wanna drink while in the bus traveling down the road all is is going to take is someone seeing that open beer can while they pass. Like has already been said, in many places it is illegal. Even if it isn't you probably won't make some people happy. I know several people that will call the cops if they see that. I'll admit I am one of them. Don't mean to be a buzz-kill but once drunk driving has affected your life you tend to get zero tolerance. You may be having fun but you are also risking more lives than those buddies with you in the bus.

You are already going to be attracting more attention than normal simply because you're a group traveling in a bus. I've talked to several cops, especially highway patrolmen, that tell me the bus will draw attention because they are used for two things that at times mean drunken rowdy crowd: Party Buses and Tailgaters. Being a large crowd in the bus is going to get you some sort of attention. You will draw eyes and if any of your group is being rowdy, someone is going to call.

Also, if you gotta hide it when you get pulled over you are going to really flag a cop. If the cops sees the movement in the bus then you guys are going to be under a lot of scrutiny. If part of the group is drinking and you guys are trying to hide the booze then the cop can use that movement as a justification that one of the drinkers had been driving and the scramble was to change out the drunk driver. It is a lot easier to do that in a bus than a car, and all it takes is the wrong cop to throw a whole lot of charges and you that you then have to disprove. In a moving bus how likely is it going to be that someone will spill their drink. The smell of beer is unique especially to a trained cop.

[chev49]

What if we are hauling hundreds of gallons of it between the raised floor and the bus floor?

[bhays]

You could always masquerade as a prisoner transport bus... works for us..

[telluriders]

Originally Posted by bhays

You could always masquerade as a prisoner transport bus... works for us..

ahhhhhhhhhh thats genius!!! looks legit!!!

I wonder if putting my wilderness EMT stickers on the back would help?? Or like a stick family sticker??
Also, am i correct in assuming that it is safer (with good headlights) and less conspicuous to travel at night, at least on on highways?

Originally Posted by RavensOracle

The best advice I can give is-

"Don't mess with my life, I won't mess with yours."

What I mean by that is most people won't give a damn about you travelling unless you are interfering with them in some way. If you wanna drink while in the bus traveling down the road all is is going to take is someone seeing that open beer can while they pass. Like has already been said, in many places it is illegal. Even if it isn't you probably won't make some people happy. I know several people that will call the cops if they see that. I'll admit I am one of them. Don't mean to be a buzz-kill but once drunk driving has affected your life you tend to get zero tolerance. You may be having fun but you are also risking more lives than those buddies with you in the bus.

You are already going to be attracting more attention than normal simply because you're a group traveling in a bus. I've talked to several cops, especially highway patrolmen, that tell me the bus will draw attention because they are used for two things that at times mean drunken rowdy crowd: Party Buses and Tailgaters. Being a large crowd in the bus is going to get you some sort of attention. You will draw eyes and if any of your group is being rowdy, someone is going to call.

Also, if you gotta hide it when you get pulled over you are going to really flag a cop. If the cops sees the movement in the bus then you guys are going to be under a lot of scrutiny. If part of the group is drinking and you guys are trying to hide the booze then the cop can use that movement as a justification that one of the drinkers had been driving and the scramble was to change out the drunk driver. It is a lot easier to do that in a bus than a car, and all it takes is the wrong cop to throw a whole lot of charges and you that you then have to disprove. In a moving bus how likely is it going to be that someone will spill their drink. The smell of beer is unique especially to a trained cop.

yeah i feel your pain, however it would not be me drinking just my passengers. Additionaly, i was tole that if i put a partition with a door behind the driver seat that it would need a warrant to even be opened, nor could i be accountable for the activities within (kind of like a limo driver.) Just wondering, tryin to learn some stuff!
thanks!
-jake

[bhays]

Originally Posted by telluriders

Additionaly, i was tole that if i put a partition with a door behind the driver seat that it would need a warrant to even be opened, nor could i be accountable for the activities within (kind of like a limo driver.) Just wondering, tryin to learn some stuff!
thanks!
-jake

Like this?

[lornaschinske]

"the side of the road is not the place to argue..."

[RavensOracle]

I understood you were not going to be drinking and driving. My point that I was trying to make, that even when I reread my post didn't come across clear, was that if you have any drinker in the rear that cant keep his **** together and not be an obvious drunk. Then you are going to be taking a lot of risks of getting pulled over.

An example I'll give you was when I was in the military on a temporary duty assignment. The unit I was with had rental vans from the base. The vans all had gov't tags on them and were there for the specific purpose of being used by the temporary guys that were on the base. I was volun-told to be DD for some of the younger airmen that had a rep of not being able to hold their alcohol out on the town that night so that. It took one guy thinking it was funny to be obnoxious to other drivers while we were heading back to base for us all to end up in jail waiting for our commander to bail us out. The police had nothing on me. I had zero alcohol in my system. The police dash camera proved that no one changed places with me once the van was pulled over so they couldn't say that we had switched to a sober driver. But I still was handcuffed and I still spent the night in jail.

I think the question is not "How do I get away with it if I'm gonna be pulled over?" But "Can I trust my buddies to be able to hold their liquor and not act like an idiot to get my ass arrested." It all comes down to if you want to risk it. Like has been said earlier, the drinking can wait til you are stopped. If it can't then your buddies have issues.

[RavensOracle]

I also wanted to add that the reason I mentioned the vans was that the police were already looking for those vans because of previous experience with drunks. Which will also be your case because you are going to look like a tailgate/ party-bus and the police pay attention to those. Being a bus full of college-or-so age guys is going to be enough for probable cause to some cops. It may not be right but it is how it works.

[opus]

Get on Facebook and read this: https://www.facebook.com/groups/busnuttn/ The question posed was this: "Question ; Does the DOT or State police have the right to come on the bus and search the bus even if the reasion for stopping you was something else. With out a warrent." [aside from the spelling, its good].

Make it a dry and smoke free bus. Here is your chance for you all to act like responsible adults and be a good example. ;)

[Stuff]

I wouldnt advertise something you are not! although my bus has a good slogan in the rear window :P

[telluriders]

Originally Posted by Stuff

I wouldnt advertise something you are not! although my bus has a good slogan in the rear window :P

hey now thats pretty good! very simple & sweet!

Originally Posted by bhays

Like this?

That looks great!!! Did you construct that with the intent of providing privacy from boarding pigs?! haha

[chev49]

Where is the donut bar?

[Stuff]

heck of a divider. but sucks for who is driving!