just out of interest, where did you see the longest queue at an attraction? and were you in it?
the longest and slowest i have been in was probably that for the eiffel tower.+1hr.queue was longer than the base of the tower.

It wasn't in Europe, but we waited more than 3 hours to tour the U.S.S. Missouri when it was docked in Astoria, Oregon.

Colosseum on our first trip to rome.
The line must have had over 400 people in it. needless to say we passed on this til next visit.

Have you ever been to Disney World on a week end?

how about the lines for the NON-EU citizens to get residency permits in spain?
this is an all morning/day affair in some cities. 4-6 hours each time you go.

i'll take disney on a weekend anytime.

4-6 hours is an eternity , but going to apply for a residence permit is not something you choose to do for leisure.

Disneyland in July was the worst experience of my life for waiting in lines, that is if you don't count waiting in the traffic on the drive to get there. I will take any line in Europe of that any day.

Longest attraction queues I've experienced would be equally St. Marks Cathedral (Venice) and the Uffizi Gallery (Florence). St. Marks moved remarkably fast, the Uffizi, painfully slow. I think the Uffizi lineup took about 3 hours. We took turns in minding each other's places so we could wander about, go to the bookshop, have a coffee etc.

The longest (time wise) line up at an airport to get through customs was about 2-3 hours at Delhi International.

Atlanta's Hartsfield airport. The attraction, the security gate.
The line was about half a mile.

brookwood-

Not an attraction, but certainly a novelty - first McDonalds in Moscow, back in the late eighties. It was about 3 hours long, probably worse than a queue to US Embassy on the days they were accepting immigration applications

The 3 hours line to see Lenin's mummy in the Mausoleum, in the middle of a winter, with sub-zero temperatures.

But personally, the longest and the worst - a queue to the elevator to get down in Eiffel Tower - I think the worst part is that you no longer have any choice and can not walk away (once you go up you kind of have to come down, queue or not ) I blanked out the exact waiting time and the whole experience - it probably was my worst travel experience ever

Standing in line for approximately 8 hours
on October 16, 2004 in Los Angeles for
a flu shot!

No, I refuse to wait in a queue that is very long on a two week vacation, rather people watch. My last queue was a serendipity. We thought we were in traffic hangup but we ended up on a ferry. I loved it!!!

Statue of Liberty way back in the summer of 2000 - 3 hrs!!!

We foolishly followed suggestions and arrived at the Vatican about an hour before it opened. The line seemed a mile long. In addition to the hour we waited before it opened it was about another hour to get to the front -- 2 in all. We realized since that if you arrive any other time, the line will be just as long -- but you avoid that extra hour of waiting for it to open.
Now we know!

Without a doubt...3 hours in the hot sun this July in Tiennamen Square wating to see Mao.....needless to say we decided to go to the worlds largest KFC instead a block away.

We waited in line for over 90 minutes in our car to get past a big ball of string on the side of the road in Kansas once. It was such an annoyance. We didn't even know it was there. I can't imagine people drove there on purpose. What a waste.

I think the longest line I've seen was for the Vatican, however it moved relatively fast, and wasn't so bad.

On the other hand, the kiddie rides in Disneyland's Fantasyland are deceptively short, but are VERY slow! Dumbo, the FLying Elephants, and Mr. Toad's Wild Ride come to mind......

Back to europe: The Eiffel Tower line was pretty bad. When we got inside, before we got on the elevator, it was very crowded and hot.

The longest line, earliest in the day and out of peak season was at St. Mark's in Venice---the line was out to the canal and snaking around, and that was still 30 minutes before opening. And this was in May. MAY!!

So, to preserve our happy memories of Venice, we skipped it. Chastise us all you want--we're comfortable with the decision.

allovereurope, I had the same experience with trying to see the Basilica at St. Mark's last July. We tried three times and opted against it all three times because the line was so long.

Just gives us a reason to have to go back, right?