I spent 3 1/2 hours at Alstede Farms waiting on 2 lines. It was 71 degrees. No real shade to hide from the scorching sun, only 1 or 2 tents that had picnic tables which were already occupied. \r
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The place was obviously very popular because it was filled to BEYOND capacity. One road with bumper to bumper traffic leads to the farms. And even though there was barely room to walk around in the place workers kept ushering in more vehicles to park. The lines for the refreshment stand were very long and very slow. And so was the line for the ONE ticket booth. You need a ticket to do everything. They had about 10 parking attendants and only 1 or 2 people working the counters. Once you got your ticket you had to wait on another long line to do something else. On this trip, my 3 year old niece wanted to ride a pony. The line didn't look too long, but it was terribly slow because they only had one pony to use at a time. A man walked the pony into the distance then walked back. A tediously slow process. Two hours later, when it was my niece's turn, she was hot, cranky and upset. She didn't want to ride the pony anymore. Besides, they cut the ride short by the time it was our turn because the line was still terribly long and the ""ride"" ended at 4 o'clock. The ticket cost $5. ALL SALES FINAL. We also bought 5 tickets ($2 each) for the hayride which we couldn't use because we were all so cranky. All together, we spent about $20 to sit in the sun for 3 hours doing nothing. The only thing my niece got to do was jump on the haystacks.\r
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We didn't get to pick our pumpkins. Although, we did not want to by this time because we knew that if we did, we'd have to wait on another long line in the sun just to pay for them.\r
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There's a small store that I couldn't even get in because of several long lines. People were also using it as a way to get some shade.\r
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Alstede Farms is poorly set up. Never again!
Cons: Everything
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