Why You Need to Pick Up a Park Map at Disney World
We are in a day and age where paper copies are becoming redundant. We get emails for everything, our phones are constantly with us for ready use, and frankly it’s more environmentally friendly. It may have you thinking that you don’t need park maps for your park days during your Disney vacation. Park maps are a useful tool that you’ll want to have for each park during your vacation, you should also pick up maps for the waters parks, your resort and for Disney Springs. There are a number of reasons why you’ll want to have these maps handy, let’s take a look at them.
My Disney Experience App
There is the My Disney Experience App that you can download on your phone but friends, it takes up a lot of battery power. So if you want to use your phone for staying in touch with family members during the day or taking pictures and videos then you don’t want to drain your battery looking at the map on this app. The app doesn’t work the best on older phones, so if you don’t have the latest version of your phone you may find that the app doesn’t even work on your phone. So do yourself a favour and have a park map in your backpack or purse.
Lists
On these maps you have lists of every category of things in every areasof the parks. This means character experiences, dining, stage shows, attractions and shops. All in one convenient place.
Festivals
If you are visiting Epcot during any of their festivals, you are going to want a park map. The park map will give you information that you’re not going to be able to find on the app. You’ll see all the festival kiosk locations, all the special entertainment locations and special offerings that are only happening during this particular festival. For example, during the Flower & Garden festival, there are a lot of kid interactive play areas that are only set up during this festival. If you don’t have a map you could very well miss them.
Parties
Each party is going to have its own map of sorts. This is going to tell you where all the special events are taking place. Things like dance parties, special character experiences, candy spots and also what is not open during the party. During the Halloween party there are trick or treating locations found all over the Magic Kingdom, there’s no way you’d locate them all without a map.
Ideas
By looking at the map you’ll have ideas of what to do in the area you’re in. By looking at the map you may realize there’s a great dining location just around the corner from where you are. It’s hard to know every single thing that’s offered at any of the parks. By looking at the map it’s all in one convenient place.
Information
At the bottom of the map there’s a legend of all the different symbols on the map. So whether you want information of which rides have a minimal height requirement or which rides have physical considerations it’s all in one easy location. I used this a lot on our first pregnant vacation. By simply looking at the map I knew which attractions I could enjoy and which I couldn’t. There are symbols that will tell you how expensive each of the dining locations should be.
Get to Know Your Resort
The resorts at Walt Disney World are huge and if it wasn’t for your map, you may have no idea to get from one of end of the resort to the other. With a map you can find out where the different pools are, dining locations, bus stops, laundry facilities. You’ll receive one upon arrival with your building circled and your room number on the top but hold onto during your stay so you don’t get lost or miss out on any of the many offerings of your resort.
Being Present
By using a map you will force yourself to be more present with your family during your trip. If you’re always looking at your phone you’re distracted. Maybe you intend to only check which restaurants are in Fantasyland but while your phone is out you end up checking a few emails and before you know it you’ve spent 30 minutes responding to a work email. Give yourself the gift of being in the moment with your family.
Where can you find maps?
When you check into your resort you’ll receive a booklet with maps for each park, there’s also a selection found at the front desk. You can grab maps at the entrance of each of the theme parks. Most cast members found in the park will have a map, specifically custodians, kiosk workers and cast members found on the streets. At the checkout of any of the park shops will also have park maps. So if you leave your map on an attraction or behind at a restaurant have no fear, there’s a convenient spot to pick one up at any time during your day.
We love having these on hand to help pass time while waiting in line for attractions or waiting for stage shows to begin. I also remember checking things off when I was younger at each attraction we rode. You’ll never regret having one of these maps. Happy Planning, Friends.
