The Dark Side of Disney
Page 1
The Dark Side of Disney
Leonard Kinsey
Praise for
THE DARK SIDE OF DISNEY
“The Dark Side of Disney shines a light into the roachy shadows of Walt Disney World. With 33 years of experience storming the gates of the Magic Castle, Leonard Kinsey has explored every possible option for a low-cost Disney vacation ranging from the immoral to the downright illegal. Packed with all the tips that Disney was hoping you wouldn’t discover, like free parking and bottomless beverage scams, this book also teaches you how to get free airline drink tickets and bar/pool hop around the high end Disney resorts like Hollywood glitterati.
Ever wanted to know where to have uninterrupted coitus on property? Kinsey points the way. Where to score weed? Keep reading. Kinsey charges to the roof of The Contemporary and spelunks into The Utilidors to bring you the finest nuances of an underground Disney vacation.
Pack the trunks and leave the kids at Grandma’s because The Dark Side is about to make your next Disney vacation the best one ever!”
-Chris Mitchell
Author, Cast Member Confidential
Copyright 2011, Leonard Kinsey
Cover Design by Pentakis Dodecahedron
Cover Photo by Alan Partlow
Cover Model: Draven Star
Book Design by Jonas Kyle-Sidell
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is neither authorized nor sponsored nor endorsed by the Disney Company or any of its subsidiaries. It is an unofficial and unauthorized book and not a Disney product. The mention of names and places associated with the Disney Company and its businesses are not intended in any way to infringe on any existing copyrights or registered trademarks of the Disney Company but are used in context for educational purposes, or for parody. The opinions and statements expressed in the quotations and text are solely the opinions of the author or those people who are quoted and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and policy of the Disney Company and its businesses nor Bamboo Forest Publishing.
Although the Publishers and the Author of this book have made every effort to ensure the information was correct at the time of going to press, the Publishers and the Author do not assume and herby disclaim any liability to any party for any loss or damage caused by errors, omissions, misleading information, or any potential travel disruption due to labor or financial difficulty, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause.
Any descriptions of illegal activities in the book are intended purely for educational or entertainment purposes. The Publishers and the Author do not support, advocate, encourage or endorse any illegal acts described herein. In no event will the Publishers or the Author be liable for any illegal activities performed by readers of this book. In other words, if you get busted and go to jail, don’t blame us!
Visit us Online at:
www.darksideofdisney.com
First Printing: August, 2011
Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: Disney World, Done Dirt Cheap
Getting There
o Driving is for suckers
o Southwest is Best
o Driving Drunk on The Disney Magical Express
Staying There
o Off-Site Horror Story
o A Deluxe for Less Than a Value?
Park Tickets
o Sneaking In
o Free Tickets from Timeshare Presentations
o Befriending a 15-Year+ Cast Member
o Reseller Scams
Free Parking
o At the Resorts
o AAA Diamond Pass
Eating/Drinking There
o Free Dining Is NOT Free!
o Cheap/Free Dining for Drunks and Foodies
o Grocery Delivery and Fridge Swaps Gone Wrong
Souvenirs and Merchandise
o WDW Merch is a Rip-Off
o PhotoPass Shares
Having Fun Without Spending a Dime
o Monorail Bar Crawl
o Free Boat Rides
o Pool Hopping
Chapter 2: Sex, Drugs, and Rock N’ Roll
Sex
o At the Resorts
o In the Parks
o How to Find Someone to Have Sex With
o Alternative Lifestyle Activities
o The Last Resort (Escort Services)
Drugs
o Where to Score?
o How to Safely Get High in the Parks
o Top 5 Best and Worst Places to Get High
Rock N’ Roll
o Rock Venues On-Site
o Food and Wine “Eat to the Beat”
o Nightly Epcot Acts
Chapter 3: Tricks, Tips, Scams… and Bugs
Front of the Line With a Wheelchair
Taking the Resort Monorail
FastPass Scams
Refillable Mugs
Pin Trading Scams
Bed Bugs and Other Creepy Crawlies
Chapter 4: Off-Limits Exploration
Sneaking Into The Utilidors
Backstage at Epcot
Interview with Shane Perez (Discovery Island Urban Explorer)
Interview with Hoot Gibson (Mesa Verde Times/Fresh Roasted Corn)
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
Index
Introduction
You hold in your hands the key to a Walt Disney World vacation unlike any other. Regardless of how much money you make, or how many times you’ve already been to the parks, or how much you totally fucking hate “It’s a Small World”, this book will show you a side of WDW that is unique, exciting, and absolutely, unequivocally, NOT authorized by Disney. Within these pages you’ll not only find tips on the best deals for airfare, food, and lodging (tips banned from official guidebooks and even most unofficial websites and messageboards), but diatribes on the best places in the parks to have sex, do drugs, and see a gritty rock show, complete with women throwing their underwear on the stage. You’ll hear from people who have jumped out of ride vehicles and explored off-limits areas, who have swam across alligator infested lakes to see the ruins of abandoned parks, and who have dodged security to traverse the mysterious tunnels underneath The Magic Kingdom. You’ll find tips on avoiding not only the dangerous Florida wildlife, but also the dangerous scammers who swarm Orlando like mosquitoes, just waiting to weasel you out of your hard-earned cash with their counterfeit merchandise, illegal ticket resales, and hard-sell timeshare presentations.
I’ve gathered all of this information over 33 years of visiting Walt Disney World, fortunate enough to have been born in Clearwater, Florida, and to have had a mother who shared my Disney obsession. Even though we were decidedly lower-middle class, she worked hard so she could spoil me and my sister with “Four Season Salute Passes” every Christmas, allowing us to visit as often as we wanted during non-peak months. And visit often we did, making the two-hour drive to Orlando at least once a month, often staying overnight at the (as of that time) only affordable on-site lodging, The Caribbean Beach Resort.
I don’t remember my first visit to The Magic Kingdom; I was only 16 months old, but I have seen the pictures and I look pretty fucking thrilled. However, I do distinctly remember my excitement when, in 1st grade, I found a promotional book for EPCOT Center that had been sent to my teacher and unceremoniously shoved into the community bookshelf, just waiting to get torn apart by my snot-nosed classmates. I promptly stole the book, and spent hours poring over the concept
art, genuinely believing that this park would be the best place in the world. Luckily, my mother was the manager of a day care, and since EPCOT at that time was touting itself as learning center (something that has long since been abandoned), she was able to snag opening-day tickets after much pleading on my part. I remember that first visit to EPCOT, in awe at seeing the concept art I’d been studying come to life, and having my mind blown by the architecture, animatronics, and a totally kick-ass vision of the future. I fell in love with computers that day, and became a nerd for life. And I remember knowing with all my heart that, yes, this actually was the best place in the world. I still believe that to this day.
Because, and I want to make this clear, I LOVE WALT DISNEY WORLD! I know the parks like the back of my hand, and I could walk through them blindfolded, guided only by the lovely scents and sounds meticulously crafted by those brilliant Imagineers. There’s a comfort in being there, like returning home. Except that when I actually do go back to my childhood home, everything has changed. They tore down the forests I used to play in, paved over the pond I fished in, and repainted my house bright pink. Nothing is familiar, nothing is comforting. But for the most part Walt Disney World stays the same, always providing the sights, sounds, and smells that immediately bring me back to a more carefree time in life. And when it doesn’t stay the same, when the company fucks up, like when Horizons was torn down, at least I’m not the only one grieving; there are thousands of others across the world to commiserate with.
It should also be known that I’m a huge fan of Walt Disney himself, devouring any and all documentaries and biographies I can find about the man. I’m consistently finding inspiration in his life story, his determination against all odds, and his visionary, forward-thinking outlook not only on family entertainment, but on the human experience and the future of mankind. From viewing his final EPCOT film and reading his final interviews, it seems as if he was ready to completely redefine city living, in a real paradigm-shifting game-changing sort of way. I believe he could have done it, too, could have pulled it all together just as he’d achieved the impossible countless times before, and I feel for Roy Disney and Card Walker for having to pick up the pieces, desperately trying to make something out of them without their leader at the helm. It’s a shame that what we ended up with in Kissimmee is a Walt Disney World only half-finished, only half-perfect. But half of perfection is still pretty fucking awesome.
So, no, I don’t have some big grudge against Disney, and the purpose of this book is not to try to destroy the company or dissuade people from visiting their theme parks. Quite the opposite, in fact; I wrote this book hoping to provide a definitive answer the assholes who always ask, “You’re going there again?! Why do you keep going to that kiddie place?” and then shake their heads while they head back to Aspen or Vegas for the 80th time for their “adult” vacations.
Honestly, I have to admit that I once thought this way, too. No matter how big of a fan-boy I was, by age 16 or so I was bored as hell with WDW, having already visited the (at that time) three parks over 100 times. So I started experimenting with “alternative activities” every time I got dragged back there, and began to gather some of the tips in this book. This really came to a head when I was in college, running the campus television station, and desperate for content to fill our 24/7 programming roster. I was going home for Spring Break, and had a brilliant idea: I’d go to WDW and film all of the crazy shit my friends and I had been doing there for years, and then broadcast it on the station as a multi-part documentary. And thus was born the first incarnation of THE DARK SIDE OF DISNEY, complete with a CGI Tinkerbell lookalike shoving her magic wand into some guy’s ass in the opening credits (meant as an homage to the Tinkerbell in the Disney Sunday Movies intro). I received no feedback, and to be honest, even though it was broadcast to every dorm on campus at least 200 times, I’m still not sure anyone watched the damn thing. I mean, what college kid in his right mind gives a shit about Walt Disney World? Most of them only cared about sex, drugs, and rock and roll… which I did, too, just as long as they took place at WDW. And I’m only half joking, unfortunately…. I didn’t get laid much in college!
Regardless, as much as I love Walt Disney World, if it weren’t for the tips in this book, I wouldn’t go back nearly as often as I do. There are only so many times you can ride Space Mountain before it starts getting boring, but riding it on ‘shrooms while getting a handjob is a totally different experience! So what we have here are at least 20 years of me pushing the limits just a little bit each time I returned to WDW, always trying to have a unique and exciting vacation. And now I’m releasing those tips to all of you, hoping you’ll give WDW another chance, and maybe recapture some of that wonder, and yes, magic, you had for the place when you were a kid. Because we’re all kids at heart, still desiring that same of thrill of newness that every day seemed to bring in those early years, but always knowing the comfort and safety of home lay just a few steps away. Well, Walt Disney World is home to everyone, young and old, and despite the thick skin we grow as we reach adulthood, I truly believe it’s still the best place around to recapture the thrill and wonder of youth. Add in sex, booze, and other such debauchery, and that makes for one hell of a fun vacation.
Chapter 1
Disney World, Done Dirt Cheap
Let’s face it, a vacation at Walt Disney World is almost prohibitively expensive. Between plane tickets, hotel rooms, park tickets, souvenirs, and food, expenses get out of hand quickly. A lot of people save up for years for a Disney vacation, and will still have to stay at the Value resorts (or ugh, off site), don’t get Park Hoppers, and have to eat only at the quick-service restaurants. Souvenirs? Forget it. How often have you heard a parent at Mouse Gears yelling at their crying kid, “I’m not paying $30 for some stupid mouse ears!”
Let it be known that this author is certainly not rolling in the dough. Quite the opposite, in fact. But when I do WDW, I like to do it in style, and since I go at least once a year, that means I have to find ways to save a butt-ton of cash. So over the years I’ve devised numerous ways to cut costs, and to be honest, some of them are distasteful and will not appeal to the general populace. But if you want to do WDW on the ULTRA-CHEAP, read on!
GETTING THERE
Driving is For Suckers:
There’s no way around this one; you have to get to the parks somehow. I absolutely do not recommend driving if you’re more than 4 hours away. You’re basically wasting two days of your vacation in the car, and that is not a magical way to spend the beginning and the end of your vacation. Plus, with gas prices what they are now, it’s simply not economical.
My co-worker Matt told me what is probably the penultimate Disney road trip horror story. “We planned to drive down in our minivan from Baltimore,” he starts. “It’s an 18 hour drive, and my wife and I were just going to do it straight through. So we woke up at 4AM, shoved the kids, 12 and 8, into the minivan and were off.
“Everything was fine until we stopped at South of the Border in South Carolina. We went there for gas and the kids ran into the store whooping and hollering like they thought this was Disney. I’m yelling at my wife to get them back in the car, so she runs in after them. Then I stand there like an idiot for 10 minutes after I finish pumping the gas and they never come back out! So I have to go into that shithole and literally pull them out of the place. I fucking hate that tourist trap!
“Anyway, I finally get them of there after spending way too much money on cheap trinkets, and we’re a few miles away when it starts pouring down rain. Like, that crazy rain where you can’t see a foot in front of your car.
“At this point my 8 year old son decides it’s the perfect time to start shooting off a bunch of party poppers he pocketed at South of the Border. You know, those little things where you pull the string and they explode and a bunch of shit comes flying out? Well he rips through what seems like five or six of them in about two seconds and is laughing like a maniac. My 12 year old daughter star
ts yelling, “My eyes are burned!” so my wife freaks out and is screaming at me to pull over, and I don’t know what the fuck is going on so I’m in the middle lane swerving around and freaking out. I end up swiping a car in the right lane while I’m desperately trying to get over to the median. That car skids out, gets hit by another car, which gets hit by another car, and so on.
“We finally stop in the median and I look back and see almost a dozen cars stacked up on I95. There’s fire, there’s a lady stumbling out of her car with blood pouring out of her face, and the fucking rain has turned to hail and there are bloody people getting pelted and just falling on the ground screaming.
“It was the most horrendous thing I’ve ever witnessed in my life. The 12 year old is still in therapy because of it. We never did get to Disney. That was easily the worst vacation I’ve ever been on, and probably the worst experience of my life.”
Moral of the story: take a plane!
Southwest Is Best: