The Dark Side of Disney - Leonard Kinsey [37]
Nightly Epcot Acts:
If you can’t make it for Food and Wine, there’s also great rock music to be found on a daily basis at Epcot other times of the year. “The British Revolution” puts on five sets a night at the UK Pavilion, featuring a full spread of British Invasion tunes, from Queen to Zep to The Who and The Stones. While they don’t dress up like their predecessors, “The British Invasion” (a Beatles tribute act), they’re actually pretty fucking kick ass and heavier than anything else you’re going to see at WDW. It’s a real legit rock show! And true to form on the weekends it’s virtually guaranteed that a sluttily dressed drunken groupie will be dancing lewdly in front of their bandstand, offending parents and scaring little children, until a DisCop kindly leads her out of the park.
Off Kilter, the kilt-wearing celtic rock band (who are incredible musicians) receive similar treatment from the ladies during their daily performances next to the Canada Pavilion, and I’ve even seen panties thrown up on stage during their gigs on crazier Food and Wine nights! Granted, the panties were thrown by overweight 50-somethings, but still… ROCK AND FUCKING ROLL AT DISNEY!!!
Chapter 3
Assorted Tricks, Tips, Scams… and Bugs
TRICKS
Front of the Line With a Wheelchair:
People who say that being disabled at WDW doesn’t give you front of line access are partially full of shit. It’s true that the newer parks and rides, built after the “Americans with Disabilities Act” (ADA) requirements ruled the World, usually have fully accessible handicapped entrances via the regular queues. On those rides, you’re waiting along with everyone else, and truth be told, the wait is often longer because you have to be seated in a special handicapped seat, and there are a limited amount of those on most rides.
However, at Magic Kingdom and EPCOT the large majority of the rides were built pre-ADA and thus the queues are too narrow or winding to fit wheelchairs. As a result, you usually get to skip the lines altogether and are ushered through a back entrance, effectively giving you front-of-line privileges. How well this works sometimes varies depending on how many other handicapped people are doing the same thing; sometimes the wheelchairs seem to be lined up further back than the real queue. But more often than not you go in through the exit of the ride, hop in one of the cars, and you’re off; no waiting at all!
You don’t even have to be in a wheelchair to gain access to the handicapped entrances! If you go to Customer Service at any of the parks you can receive a Guest Assistance Card (aka a GAC), which you show to the ride attendants for redirection to handicapped queues. If you’re not actually in a wheelchair, though, you might not get any special treatment unless you have some invisible impairment. Obviously it’s pretty easy to fake this, and a lot of people do just that, saying their kid has autism and can’t wait in long lines, or they have MS and can’t stand for extended periods of time, etc. Disney isn’t legally allowed to request verification of this due to the ADA, so they just have to take people on their word.
It’s more than a bit scummy to pretend to be disabled just to take advantage of FOL handicapped entrances, but if you are legitimately impaired, even temporarily, you should at least know that WDW is for the most part very wheelchair-friendly. If you do visit in a wheelchair it’s best to bring your own, because their rentals are extremely expensive