Smokers at WDW

[Mom2PrincessK]

My parents are planning their first trip in April (with us). We are not smokers so we never paid attention to smoking areas.

They smoke quite a bit and I am concerned that a large portion of time is going to be spent hunting down smoking areas.

How many areas are there in each park? Is there a map of them available? We are staying at PORS - where is the smoking area at the hotel?

Any comments from smokers (or non-smokers that have travelled with smokers) on how they coped?

 

[maxiesmom]

I don't smoke, but my mom does. We have found that it is very easy to find the smoking areas at both the resorts and the parks. They are marked on the maps so you shouldn't have any problems.

 

[danielle.st]

I don't smoke but it seemed like the entire time we were there last, I was constantly walking ito smoking areas by accident. It seems like there must be a lot of smoking areas for as often as I stumbled into one!

 

[kp22090]

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[rubato]

I'm married to a smoker. The last 2 times we went, I used the map and had a little card I laminated for each park with the locations of the smoking areas. It helped a lot. And, he could go smoke while my son and I found the restrooms. We didn't waste time looking for the designated areas, but, of course, I felt we wasted the 5 minutes while he smoked! But, that's a different story!

 

[DisneyWisher]

I feel your pain. We stopped taking DBF because after every ride he needed a smoke. As non smokers DD and I got tired of standing around while he smoked. At our resort he would go out to the car to smoke, it was closer than any of the smoking areas.


http://allears.net/acc/portorleansmap.jpg map of POR with smoking areas.
http://allears.net/tp/ak/akmap.jpg AK
http://allears.net/tp/ep/epcotmap.jpg Epcot
http://allears.net/tp/mk/mkmap.jpg MK
http://allears.net/tp/mgm/studiomap.jpg DHS

These are just to help you get an idea.

 

[Pakey]

I feel your pain. Our middle son and his wife are smokers, heavy smokers. Seriously, they would have to leave in the middle of a meal to go find someplace to smoke when we dined at Signatures due to the lengthy meals.

Word of advice. Do not wait on them. If you do, you will either be spending all of your time trying to find the smoking areas or standing there with them. We did that through the first family vacation but we've learned; the last two times have been much better.

In the morning at the resort, we told them to have their smoke prior to our meeting time. As soon as we'd get to the park, they'd have to find a place to smoke. We told them what ride we were going to and they could meet us at the exit. Any time during the day that they felt the need, we'd just inform them where we were going next.

At the resort, I request that their room be on the ground floor "close" to a smoking area. Since we usually stay BCV, they get a ground floor facing the quiet pool since there's a smoking area there. The rest of us get a room as far away as possible.

 

[Mom2PrincessK]

Thanks to all who responded - in looking at the maps, I can't believe how many areas there are! I swear I only remember seeing one or two before (of course we weren't looking for them!) That does help me relax a bit - I was afraid we would be crossing the park every hour or so to get to the designated area

As always - DISers rock!

 

[Order66]

At MK and HS there are DSA's in a lot of locations basically in each "land" of the parks. At AK and EP I found them to be a little bit more spread out and farther to get to, but still not unreasonable. I think mainly because those 2 parks are more spread out. I found most restraunts at the parks and/or resorts had a DSA within a reasonable distance from the restraunt so it wasn't a problem to go to after a meal. The only real "issue" I have (as a smoker) is the WS in Epcot where you have to walk sometimes a country or two to get to a DSA after eating somewhere. But still not so bad you can't comply with it.

BTW, I don't have anything against smokers, but, please, don't smoke in a common area, they have designated smoking areas for a reason.

As someone who smokes, I do respect this. I also wish people would respect us too. In other words, don't bring your kids to sit on the benchs in the DSA for a break and then give us all evil looks for smoking near your kids.

(not directed at the PP who's quote I copied, but to give the other side of the opinion which I encountered quite a bit on our last trip.)

Thank you and carry on.........

 

[Cafeen]

We were there in September, and, really, finding a DSA is not too difficult. There are a few that are more convenient (thank god for Firefox's spell check, that is one word I can never spell) than others, but overall it's quite decent.

I will warn you though, few (if any) of these DSAs are covered (none of the ones we went to were that I noticed), so if it's raining, you're parents are going to get wet. Also, several of them (if not most) are pretty well hidden. If all else fails, ask a nearby CM and they'll usually direct you. I also noticed that Epcot's map (mostly in FW) was a bit off on several, which made for some, interesting, walking around some times. We typically kept to a few certain central ones and that worked out quite well. Good thing it didn't rain though... (well, one night, after we were at the resort... and then it was a good thing we had towels.)

 

[2Tiggies]

Hi, thought I would add my two cents - for what it is worth. There are plenty of smoking areas on the map, but I found that they were not always easy to find as they are mostly set off of the main pathways, often behind a tree or something. Also, check that one of those ashtrays are there - I say this as once or twice I went to use a smoking area and noticed cigarette ends lying on the ground and no ashtray so I decided on those occasions to wait until later on and try elsewhere. One evening I was walking by one of these "ashtrayless" areas and overheard a CM telling smokers that the DSA had moved for some reason.

I don't know if this will work for the OP's company, but there are so many distractions when you are there, I don't think about smoke breaks until I am actually looking for somewhere to sit and rest.

 

[Missytara]

I also traveled with three girlfriends a few years ago, two of whom smoked. They would take long leisurely smoke breaks, sometimes up to an hour and a half. In addition, they would smoke wherever they felt like it and we were constantly reprimanded for being in a common guest area. The worst was when we were waiting for the afternoon parade. One of my friends just stepped back about five feet and lit up; I thought we were going to be thrown out right then and there. I was flustered and mortified.

Finally, my third friend and I told them on the second day, they could sit and smoke as long as they wanted - but we were there to ride the attractions, not sit around for hours at a time doing nothing. After about a day, they realized what they were missing, and got into the program.

I think the key is to keep them moving.

 

[jb01]

Does anyone know about those e-cigs? Are they allowed in the park?

 

[Metro West]

Does anyone know about those e-cigs? Are they allowed in the park?

I believe you should handle those as regular cigarettes...only use them in the smoking areas. I don't know if Disney has an official policy on them or not.

 

[Dopey420]

I think my mom was more impressed by the smoking areas in Animal Kingdom than anything else at WDW!

 

[BayouMickey]

Does anyone know about those e-cigs? Are they allowed in the park?

I used mine in Innoventions sitting right next to a CM. He was amazed lol. There is no policy for it. It's water vapor that disapates rapidly so there's no public risk. In fact that CM plus a few others he had to "show" wished that this was more in the public eye because of the decline risk in secondary exposure.

 

[BayouMickey]

I believe you should handle those as regular cigarettes...only use them in the smoking areas. I don't know if Disney has an official policy on them or not.

Idiotic thinking, no PP I'm not calling you an idiot, just the idea.
People smoke ecigs to quit smoking. Sending them to the smoking area is like telling a crack addict "We have a cure for your addiction but you have to go get it in a crack house". Ecigs are safe and does not risk others around you. If it's because you don't like looking at it, you can turn away. Just like those hefty men in speedos..

 

[Metro West]

Idiotic thinking, no PP I'm not calling you an idiot, just the idea.
People smoke ecigs to quit smoking. Sending them to the smoking area is like telling a crack addict "We have a cure for your addiction but you have to go get it in a crack house". Ecigs are safe and does not risk others around you. If it's because you don't like looking at it, you can turn away. Just like those hefty men in speedos..

Oh I know and I agree but you know what public opinion is of smoking today. It's just better to be safe staying in the smoking areas than to risk a confrontation with someone over water vapor...you know?

 

[BayouMickey]

Oh I know and I agree but you know what public opinion is of smoking today. It's just better to be safe staying in the smoking areas than to risk a confrontation with someone over water vapor...you know?

Forgive me, I'm not understanding your rationale. You are saying a person should risk temptation of re-addiction because of public opinion?

 

[Metro West]

Forgive me, I'm not understanding your rationale. You are saying a person should risk temptation of re-addiction because of public opinion?

No...I was talking about not using the e-cigarette just anywhere even though you could w/o harm to anyone else. I was saying to say in the smoking areas because if you were walking around using it anywhere, someone would probably say something to you.

I guess I completely misunderstood your post.