Show up at noon.
Parks have their biggest crowds at mid-day. Arrive early, or way later, to find the shortest lines.
Buy your tickets at the front gate.
Don't waste time in line when you could be in the park. Buy your tickets in advance to find the best deals, too.
Forget to wear sunscreen.
Unless you really, really love crispy skin with a side of melanoma.
Stop in the middle of a walkway.
Please, to help the flow of traffic behind you, move to the side when you need to stop.
Get into the biggest line you see.
Really, do we even need to explain this one? Yet long lines have magnetic qualities, attracting the clueless.
Push, pull or tug a character.
Be nice to the folks with the toughest job in the park. The costumes look soft and fluffy on the outside, but on the inside, they're often a frame of metal and hard plastic, waiting to jab the helpless employee inside if pushed the wrong way.
Make a crying child go to something.
Theme parks are supposed to be fun, not exercises in cruelty. Plus, many rides won't load a crying child, holding up the line for everyone behind you.
Never use lifts or tricks to make a child appear taller than s/he is.
Height requirements are there for a reason.
Try to jump off a ride.
Stupid. Dangerous. Forces the park to shut down the ride, inconveniencing hundreds of other visitors. Then, you get tossed from the park and possibly arrested, too.
Carry around a large souvenir.
Every park has some package check or delivery service, so you can pick up your purchases when you leave.
Got a few to add to the list? Submit yours in the comments.
Update: On the flip side, here are the top things you always should do when visiting a theme park.
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Never, ever, ever stop in the middle of a main street section of the park.
...think you are more important than those around you. Just because you've waited an hour for a ride doesn't mean you get special treatment before anybody else whose also waited an hour. In fact, the rules are there for everyone - don't cut line, don't hold 15 spaces for the whole extended family, don't curse, don't complain loudly about the Florida heat (we all feel it!), don't barge in front of everyone when the queue opens up to a general standing/seating area.
You should never NOT be courteous to those around you, and that includes the attendants and ride operators. They are responsible for the smooth, SAFE running of a ride and any extra distractions beyond those normally planned for in moving people in and out are annoying and at worst dangerous.
But here's another question - what's the limit in innocently chatting with cast members (I use Disney as an example). The Haunted Mansion is famous for having "in character" cast members. When is it too much when you try to interact with them? What's the limit (aside from obvious limits like touching, etc)?
Never wait to decide what you are going to order when you get to the cashier at meal times. Have your order planned out before hand and your payment method ready. Disney meal lines are especially stressful and these delays only add to it.
Bottom line: never get into the kiddie's section if using a motorized wheelchair and look around when you drive it on the rest of the theme park.
This kind of thing needs to be printed in a Newspaper or posted online on Yahoo or Google! Spread the word! What ever happened to courtesy too?
Since almost every visitor does this, the quick-service lines for food you might not even like will get terribly long.
Can never understand why anyone would want to put their child in danger this way. There have been times I just want to shake the parents.
If you want to bring your older child to a park for a special treat or vacation, leave the littlest ones with grandma or an aunt and uncle -- they aren't going to remember they weren't there.
(I also would give this discussion a "Like"!)
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Then there's "don't move your tall person around in the seats just when the show starts". I know why this happens, the show starts, and people who weren't paying attention suddenly look forward and find that their kids are sitting behind tall people, so they move around so their kids get better views.
The problem is that people behind you WERE paying attention, and they already arranged THEIR children to be behind YOUR children; now you have blocked them, and everybody up the rows has to re-arrange themselves during the show, simply because you didn't pay attention.
Thou shalt not push, pull or tug a character.
We were at a character breakfast and , for some reason, the Pluto character was being decidedly difficult. We were all seated around the diner, Hollywood &Vine I think, in MGM Studios. Pluto showed no inclination to move away from his little spot while Goofy and Minnie visited many tables.
The people we were with wanted a photo opportunity and headed over to where Pluto was standing. Now I'm no expert on body language but I could tell that this character just did not want to do any more than stand around. As we all sidled up beside him for a photo he tried to break ranks and get away. I grabbed him by the tail and pulled him back. I told him to stand still for 10 seconds or else I'd be very disappointed ( if you get my drift ! ).
A cardinal sin some might say. But it had to be done. The photo, by the way, was a hoot. Even wearing a costume you can tell that this guy/gal was unhappy and if you look really closely you can just about make out my clenched fist holding the tail.
Oh, and don't visit at peak seasons - dead on popular holidays. I learned it the hard way when I went to the MK on Christmas Day 1996. It was extremely crowded that I only rode "it's a small world" and Snow White's Scary Adventures! If you want some Yuletide joy, see it all in early December or (if you don't mind the idea of Christmas creep) the November before Thanksgiving. I even give my two cents on crowd levels by month at Walt Disney World in my article, "The Many Months of Walt Disney World Crowds," to help you take this advice to heart. I hope it will help you either learn a hard lesson or plan your trip there.
(sorry, everyone is a critic...)
Follow posted signs - especially no line-jumping.
Encountered this same happy family (who clearly couldn't figure out that the kid was sick) at Forbidden Journey where the kid barfed again on the hand rails in the castle. I hate to think what he did on the actual ride!
Yeah, the rest of us just love your sick child to pieces. Should have grabbed some video of it so that I could post the whole family on YouTube.
For the love of comfort, and your own safety, sensible shoes and sensible clothing, Being in the sun all day and on your feet experiencing all the rides walking from one end of the park to another in the mid summers heat youve got to be crazy.
Then to watch them walk or be carried out of the park at the end of the day due to exhaustion, no shoes on and moderate to severe case of sunburn.
Ladies a theme park is not a place to get noticed. If your wanting to get noticed or have your 15 minute of fame apply to the film studios next door.
In case anybody read the above article and still doubts that anyone would be stupid, selfish or inconsiderate enough to actually do any of these things, Rob P's comment should convince you otherwise. Just sayin'...
My response:
That wasn't you in the suit and being difficult was it Ron ?
The alternative to my quick-fix was, I suppose, to report the person for failing to do their job and risk having them sacked. Character meals don't come cheap and what we didn't expect was bad attitude from the staff. It was the employee who was being rude and awkward NOT me.
As a Disney bus driver, I'm mystified why people need to take pictures of family and friends in a darkened bus. Is it that you just don't have enough pix of people you care about with washed out faces? But here's something to remember, the those flashes affect the driver's ability to drive safely. And if you are facing forward, the flash will reflect in the rear view mirror, which is no different than walking up to them and flashing a picture in their face.
Please, please, please, if you've got to take pictures on the bus: ** DON'T USE THE FLASH !! **
Never let your child sit on top of the back part of the seat during a show. I listened to an entire production of Finding Nemo the Musical without being able to see much of it at all, because despite nicely asking both the parents and the child to have the child sit on the seat/ in their lap, they ignored it. (And they did speak English.) Both my dad and I missed out on seeing the show because of their selfishness. We understand that they wanted their child to be able to see, but put the kid on your lap for crying out loud! Its dangerous for a 4 or 5 year old to sit on a 2 inch wide ledge where they could fall backwards at any moment (on top of the people behind him) but its also common sense that if your kid's body is sticking up about a foot higher than the tallest adult's head, he is going to obstruct the vision of everyone behind him. I couldn't believe the rudeness of those parents.
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I Now cannot do anything fun at Theme parks according to your list…What’s next – I have to wear a bathing suit at water parks….??
Hahahaha