‘You are horrible people for cutting in front. Some of us have been here since 6:30’: Hiker shuts down couple cutting 20 people in a 2-hour line for a national park cave tour after park ranger refuses to intervene

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
Sep 29, 2025 6:00 PM EDT

Great Basin National Park's cave tour line looks nothing like a line and everything like a sleepy morning picnic. People with camping chairs, crumbly muffins, even travel mugs acting like everyone's just here to swap hiking tips. There's no rope, no sign, just that weird, silent contract where everyone tries to out-casual each other while actually watching the invisible order like hawks.


A young couple rolls up and plops next to the door, performing expert-level obliviousness. Maybe it's a strategy, maybe it's just too many years of brunches with bottomless mimosas. The others stay polite, letting it slide, because nothing ruins the park vibe faster than calling out strangers before breakfast, and becausr, as everyone on earth knows, the joy standing in line gives on its own is probably enough without having to fight.

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  • "We don't see lines"

    CLASSIC TOUR Please wait here for guide.
    via South_agency/Red Herring

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  • Great Basin NP has a cave tour that sells out weeks in advance. The park also has 'day of' tickets but you have to arrive early and they can only be purchased at the visitor center.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • I was warned by a ranger to arrive early since the tour sells out quickly. I arrive at 6:30 am and I'm fifth in line.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • Over the next hour and a half the line continues to grow with people drinking coffee, eating muffins, happily chatting as they wait.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • Cheezburger Image 10559164160
    via Dmitry Molchanov

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • Shortly before the doors open, a young couple sits on the wall near the doors. Nobody says anything because there's lots of reasons why people are going into the visitor center early including hike advice, campground reservations, grab a map etc.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • The ranger comes out and announces that she has 40 tickets and asks if anyone already has reservations.
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  • None of us do. She then opens the door and we file in. Young couple goes in behind me.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • Cheezburger Image 10559162112
    via VisualProduction

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  • I get my ticket and scoot to the side to see if the young couple has other business.
    via SocietyDisastrous787

  • Ranger steps out, looks like her only mission is to exist, not referee the ecosystem of entitlement blooming outside. Couples slide in ahead, all “oh, was there a line?” as if the mug circle wasn’t actually a code. Nobody buys it, but who’s signing up for a 7 am showdown over stalactites? The locals have been up since sunrise logging future material for their memoirs about why parks are for the patient or the shameless.

  • CLASSIC TOUR Please wait here for guide.
    via Red Herring

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • Nope. They want tour tickets. I looked at the ranger and said they had cut in front of 20 or so other people waiting in line.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • She just shrugged and said "well, that's not my job". The man actually said "we didn't know there was a line.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • Cheezburger Image 10559164672
    via South_agency

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • People had chairs and were talking...". I looked at them both and replied "you knew there was a line and you are horrible people for cutting in front.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • Some of us have been here since 6:30.". The woman had the nerve to give me that affronted 'how dare you say that to me!' face and I walked away.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • I'm beginning to understand why 'entitled people' is such a topic of conversation.
    via SocietyDisastrous787

  • This right here is about that gray zone where politeness turns to background noise and entitlement gets to run a little experiment called “what if rules are optional?” By the end, injustice gets a shrug from the powers that be and a death glare from everyone who actually woke up for this.

  • OP Society Disastrous 787 Update! They were not on the coveted morning tour (the tour they had originally requested) so I don't know if they switched to afternoon, or felt bad enough that they decided to skip the tour altogether. So maybe me being an ah le allowed someone who had arrived early and waited in line to get into the morning tour.
    via SocietyDisastrous787

  • onlylcancallmethat

    onlylcancallmethat That ranger was a
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • OP Society Disastrous 787 Y'know, I thought about that and although I think that the rangers need some better training about how to handle infantile adults, I also realize that they're all wondering if they'll be out of a job on Wednesday so I let it go.
    via SocietyDisastrous787
  • SunBusiness8291 Good job calling them out. Somebody should always call them out.
    via SunBusiness8291
  • Lloyd Penfold What business is it of yours? They haven't cut in front of you, have they? It's up to the people behind you to complain, Karen.
    via Lloyd Penfold

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