When asking for free cups of ice water...

[knlasv]

...do you have to stand in the food line and "order" it, or can you just walk up to the pick-up window and ask for a cup? What if your whole party wants their own cup of water? We will have 4 in our party. Thanks!

 

[DisBuckMan]

You stand in line for it.

No problem with your whole family getting their own cup.

 

[jaiminee krikit]

...do you have to stand in the food line and "order" it, or can you just walk up to the pick-up window and ask for a cup? What if your whole party wants their own cup of water? We will have 4 in our party. Thanks!

I started asking for free cups of water 2 years ago (used to buy lots of bottles - what a waste lol!) During that trip, I started just walking up to the counter and asking there for a glass of ice water. At one location, I was told I would need to order a glass of water with the cashier, so I just started doing that every time. I figure it's only fair - especially if there's a line. Sometimes the cashier will tell me to just ask the counter, but usually they will do up a ticket for me. And they'll give you as many as you want (at least in my experience). We are a party of 3, and we typically would only send one person to the line to get 3 glasses.

 

[nikkij]

I think it depends on the restaurant and the time you visit...

I've had to go up and order cups of water for my whole party through a CM while other times restaurants have had them sitting out to just grab.

 

[Hopefully]

If there is a line I would wait. To bypass the line and go to the counter is making everyone in line wait a bit longer while the CM would be helping me. I think this is the fair way to do it.

 

[HubbDave]

On a related note, the stand next to the Expedition Everest queue gives out big cups of ice water and the Somerhaus stand in Germany give huge cups. Plus you can grab the grapefruit beer

 

[mckennarose]

I think it depends on the restaurant and the time you visit...

I've had to go up and order cups of water for my whole party through a CM while other times restaurants have had them sitting out to just grab.

This has been our experience as well.

 

[Jadyreen1282]

Line jumping is against the rules at WDW....

 

[Barbara76]

I wait in line

 

[Disneylover99]

I just walk to the pick up window and ask for a cup. I've been told by cashiers to do this.

 

[RedOne3781]

I was there last week. Consumed many many cups of ice water. I stood in line for most places, but some had cast members passing already filled cups out to people off to the side. So there were kind of two separate lines: one for people ordering other things and one for people who just wanted ice water.
I guess it all depends on the location and the demand.

 

[SGMCO]

Once I got a cup of water at CS in MK and could not even drink it, it was awful tasting. I have since not tried free glass of water, do all the water taste as bad as MK water?

 

[mommyrosa2]

Once I got a cup of water at CS in MK and could not even drink it, it was awful tasting. I have since not tried free glass of water, do all the water taste as bad as MK water?

I have to say that I have found most of the water in the parks to taste gross.

The other gross thing we noticed last week....

The Starbucks at HS had two huge beverage dispensers filled with free ice water and cups for anyone wanting water. Thought that was a great idea and almost got myself a free cup until I saw SEVERAL people putting their used water bottles right up into the spicket to refill their bottles (think Poland springs water bottles) !

 

[scrapquitler]

We always wait in line unless there is a tray of filled cups at the end of the counter, which some places do at times.
And you can ask for as many as you want. We usually get two per person. because we drink the first one really quickly, then after we drink most of the second one, we dump all the ice together.

 

[bluezy]

Once I got a cup of water at CS in MK and could not even drink it, it was awful tasting. I have since not tried free glass of water, do all the water taste as bad as MK water?

I don't like the free water at any of the parks. My kids stopped to get some a few times at each park during our trip in June. I always tasted it, but still always ended up buying a bottle of water instead. I'm not really fond of their bottled water either (I prefer bottled spring water as opposed to purified water), but I drink a lot of water and the bottled water was the lesser of two evils for me.

ETA: To answer the original question, in June (this year and last) it seemed to vary by location but a lot of QS locations had a CM at one of the ordering stations that had a huge supply of cups of ice water ready to go. In those situations, you just had to walk up to that CM and ask for it. Otherwise, you need to stand in line. The other option is that if there is a CM doing "crowd control" at the ordering lines you could ask them where you should go to request a cup of ice water. Many times we've found that *that* CM would then take us over to one of the pick-up windows and tell the CM there that we wanted ice water.

 

[blackpearl77]

You have to wait in line. Or I had to at HS. Since they have to put the order in and give you a receipt for the free water. Then you wait in pick up with your receipt. But yea, I have some water that tastes good (when they fill it from the soda fountain) and then others that taste bad....we just buy it ever since the bad tasting water time.

 

[HubbDave]

The cups of water I've gotten in the past taste fine to me

Of course I drank out of a garden hose as a kid back when that was acceptable. You do get a bit of the taste of the cup itself after a bit but the water was fine