Crowds yesterday were fantastic! I haven’t seen the park that lightly attended since… ever! ;-). As many of us suspect, the good times will end once the reservation period comes to fruition (June 24). Then let the onslaught begin! ;-).
Wait times for rides was the lowest I’ve ever seen during the day. After several attractions, we headed to Pirates. At 9:30 it was
still a walk-on. We went to Mansion immediately after that and it was also a walk-on. Had a great time.
They now have new DL maps that include SWL. They’re really nice. But what was even better was the special, commemorative SWL maps. They’re done on a higher-quality card stock and look fantastic. I was told at around 7:30 yesterday morning that what they’d put out for guests was the last they had. I’d be surprised if there any even any left today. I only have one pic of both. I’ve got one or two of the nice ones at home and can take much better pics, if anyone’s interested.
Now, the big news: for years, many of us have been frustrated or, indeed, enraged by the runners at rope drop that head for PP. Yesterday a guy about 24 took off at an
Olympic sprint. Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone run that fast
anywhere, let alone at DL. We were trying to help a friend’s nieces (8 and 10) get a good spot in line and it annoyed us. I know that I quickened my pace a bit (yes, even though I know that running is against the rules). The problem with the rule is that I’ve never seen it enforced beyond the simple pleas of “Don’t run, please. Please don’t run!” which never seem to work. Yesterday, however, as we came through the castle, a (seeming) security CM was at the PP line. He wasn’t messing around. “Walk please!” he announced in a tone worthy of a drill sergeant (and rightly so). The sprinter literally ran around him and into the PP queue. This really annoyed the guy (and me and likely dozens of others). We’ve always hated that runners (i.e., cheaters) always prosper and never suffer any consequences for blatantly breaking park rules. Yesterday, however, the security guy wasn’t having it. He called/pulled the sprinter out of line and demanded his park ticket. Since I was behind him, he also asked for mine. Again, I regret that I may have run a bit. But as many of you know, runners tend to cause others to run. The principle of scarcity kicks in and suddenly there’s a guest stampede (of sorts). The CM demanded to know why the sprinter refused to stop. He replied “I didn’t hear you.” We both knew that was a bald-faced lie. He was pissed at the guy (again, rightly so and I’m glad he was). Anyway, he had both of our park tickets. He took a pic of the sprinter’s and presumably it was later entered into DL’s notorious “Treasured Guests” database. I don’t think he scanned mine, since I was reasonable, polite and apologized. The other guy was kind of a jerk. In any case, he was pulled out of line and didn’t get anything even close to first in line. I’m glad and so were many others. Walk with intention? Absolutely. An Olympic sprint? Absolutely not.
Gotta run -- no joke intended but I'll take it anyway -- so here are some pics:
This was the POTC queue later in the day. Still hardly anyone there! These are the golden days at the park and likely won't last.
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First in the park... except for those meddling kids (i.e., pesky CMs ;-)).
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I believe this is new. It's near the entrance to Plaza Inn. If it's been there all along then I've been willfully blind.
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Took this around 10:30. Look how many people weren't there ;-).
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The new park maps. The one on the right is the commemorative/collectable/souvenier map printed on higher-quality stock. I can take better pics if anyone's interested.
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I did reasonably well on Buzz yesterday. I was with a friend who's also pretty good but his first four scores of the day simply didn't come through. That's always frustrating, especially when you've got a great score. Sometime within the last month, I broke 2M on both guns and, of course, the score didn't come through. That's when you truly want to strangle Zurg! ;-).
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