We have had year passes to Disneyland on and off for a while now and this past week our latest passes expired. The day before they did though, was a day off for me and the kids so we decided to go to Disneyland one last time. I was expecting to have a good time just relaxing and riding some of our favorite rides. It turned out to be one of our stranger visit to Disneyland.
Now I know that my boys are really too old to be using strollers and that they are both old enough to walk but we still brought our stroller to make things easier and faster. We started out our visit playing around Disney's California Adventure. After going by a few areas, we parked our stroller in front of the Monsters Inc. ride and went in. Richard didn't have the day off but was joining us at the park after work. He called while we were in line and I told him where we were. He started over to meet us and asked were the stroller was. I told him and the boys and I rode the ride.
We got off the ride and I looked around for Richard and the stroller. Neither were in sight. We wait around for a little while and Richard comes walking up to us, without the stroller. Where's the stroller? He hadn't been able to find it and it's not were I parked it with all of the other strollers on the side. We look around for a while but still can't find it. We ask a couple of Disney cast members (employees) and they let us know that we can make a report and ask if we would like to do so. We say sure.
After being passed from the Monsters Inc. ride greeters to a Mumpets 3D greeter to a park mini-security person we meet John, from a little town in Scotland, lives just a few miles from us in Lakewood, really nice guy and official park security. He escorts us quickly to the lost and found, helps us make an official report, and then takes us over to the stroller rental where we pick up a couple of complementary Disney strollers to use while we finish our night.
Quick side note, we have used the Disney rental strollers before but I had forgotten how much I loved them. They are the best. We looked up once how much the regular sell-to-the-public ones cost. Super expensive.
We spent the rest of the night going between the two parks, trying to get all of our favorite rides in. I didn't get my bowl of clam chowder (it was too cold to eat outside) but we did get Josh his custom-made light saber that we were supposed to get him for his birthday.
John tried to be positive for us and let us know that sometimes people take other people's strollers but then just use them for the night and leave them in the park. The park employees eventually find them, bring them to lost and found and everything works out. He said he had even know of a case were a stroller was taken with a camera, wallet, and souvenirs and the whole thing showed up later, with everything still there. It didn't work out that way for us. Almost a week later and nothing. We didn't lose much, just our old sit-n-stand that we got when Josh was born. It was four years old and well used. The only thing in it was my sweatshirt. But it was my Minnie Mouse sweatshirt that I had bought for myself my last birthday. And we hope to have another baby some day and wanted to keep the stroller in case we do. Ugh. A bad way to say good bye to Disneyland until the next time we want to spend a bunch of money on passes.
You want to know the kicker? After our last ride, the rockets in Tomorrowland, we went to get our complementary strollers and head out when we discovered that someone had swiped one of them. Nathan walked out of the park.