If you've ever attended Austin City Limits, you know the festival is pretty strict about what you can bring inside: two sealed water bottles, no food and no large umbrellas, among other things (no audio equipment, for example — so all of these interviews were done before people entered the park).
But that list of restrictions doesn’t keep people from trying to sneak things in.
Standing in line to enter the park on Friday, Daniel Gutierrez says he's snuck in small bottles of alcohol.
“Sometimes it’s wrapping it up in the blankets and hoping the guys don’t find it," Gutierrez says. "Or [I] put it on my girlfriend.”
A little farther back in the line, festival-goers like Ashley Guidroz and Amanda Poole say they just try to sneak in a little extra food. On Friday, Poole had some suckers in her bag.
"We’ve tried Pop-Tarts," Guidroz says, remembering the last time they came from Lafayette, Louisiana, to attend the festival. "Day One we got Pop-Tarts in. Day Two, the guy took the whole box and Lebron-ed them into the trash."
"He didn’t even ask if we wanted to eat them," Poole interjected. "He just said 'Nope!'"
Guidroz's fiance, Alex Labat, jumped in.
"ACL is the only experience where Pop-Tarts make you feel scandalous," Labat says.
Guidroz and Poole say the best way to sneak things past the bag check is by hiding the items among tampons, or other female products, and making sure to choose a line with a male attendant.
Austin resident Laura Presley wasn’t as willing to divulge her secrets.
"I'm not going to tell you because then other people will steal it and my trick will get ruined," Presley say, assuring me this trick was very successful.
The second weekend of Austin City Limits starts Friday.
