Ya’ll, I don’t mean to scare you. I really don’t. But the reality is, as magical as Disney World truly is, there are still some people there who aren’t nice. And sometimes, when you are in that happy Disney bubble, you forget that not everyone is honest and not everyone has the best intentions. At almost any other tourist destination, you’d be hyperaware of being safe and careful but at Disney, we let our guard down. And that’s part of the fun and magic, isn’t it?
But sometimes bad things do happen at Disney World. And unfortunately, I know from personal experience. My family headed down to Orlando a few years ago when Disney did a special event where you could stay in Magic Kingdom for 24 straight hours, 6am Friday to 6am Saturday. It happened to land on the weekend my oldest child turned ten and we just lost our minds a little bit and drove 17+ hours down there to spend 24 straight hours in the park. And most of the experience was spectacular, but at 3am, we parked our stroller outside of The Carrousel of Progress and when we came out, it was gone. Just completely gone.
Now, we had not been using the stroller for anyone to ride in. My youngest actually spent the weekend hanging out at the hotel with a family member who was crazy enough to come down just to watch him. Instead, we had been using it to carry around the massive amount of supplies required for doing a Disney park for 24 hours! Extra clothes, extra shoes, snacks, bottled water, medicine for every possible ache or pain, sunglasses, rain ponchos, at least 8 back up batteries for our phones, and on and on and on. The stroller was our mobile prep station. We were ready for anything life threw at us that day… except having our stroller taken from us.
First, let me say that nothing super valuable was in the stroller. That is, our phones, cameras, and wallets were all on our bodies at the time–as they should be. Never, ever, ever, leave an electronic or your wallet in the stroller. EVER.
Here’s what to do if this unfortunate situation ever happens to you:
- Take a deep breath and look around the entire stroller parking area. Cast members often move your stroller within that area to fill in rows as strollers come in and out. About 99% of the time, your stroller is not actually stolen, it’s just been moved a bit. Still can’t find it?
- Notify the nearest cast member (that’s Disney for employee, if you are confused). Usually someone is stationed at stroller parking. It’s best to approach calmly and let them know. Please remember, the cast member did not steal your stroller. The cast member does not know who’s stroller is whose and can’t control someone else walking off with your stuff. So don’t yell at the cast member, just talk calmly. Let them know the details: where you parked it, what ride you went on, how long you were apart from it, and what it looks like.
- Fill out any paperwork the cast member asks you to. She may ask for specifics on what was in the stroller and offer you a chance to go into the nearest gift shop and replace items that were stolen–but do not expect that to happen. It just MIGHT. In our case, we were most devastated to lose our white board, because we had been taking the pictures marking the time and how long we’d been in the park by writing on it. They offered us a free one IF any store in Magic Kingdom sold white boards (spoiler alert: they don’t!). Do not demand free stuff. Again, this cast member didn’t steal your stroller and is only trying to help.
- Accept anything the cast member offers you. The person we worked with offered us a STACK of fast passes because the kids were sobbing. And at the time it happened, we felt too sick to think about going on rides. But after about 45 minutes we had calmed down enough to want to ride and those Fast Passes sure came in handy!
- Go file a lost item report and check lost and found at guest relations. The cast member you already spoke with can direct you there. This is different than a stolen item report. This is going to lost and find and checking to see if your items are there and filling out an official registration form so that if your stroller turns up, they can contact you to let you know. There’s always a chance someone just had their eye on your pricey stroller and dumped the diaper bag and whatever else was in it–checking with Guest Relations is a good way to find out. You’ll want to be detailed about what was lost.
- Call Lost and Found once a day for about a week after your stroller goes missing. There’s always a chance that someone grabbed your stroller by accident because it looked like theirs, and when they realized it, they were embarrassed and just abandoned it right where they were. If that is the case, it’ll turn up in lost and found.
- Check Craigslist in the Orlando area for about a month after your incident. Stolen strollers are typically stolen to be sold and Craigslist is a popular place for that. You could also check Facebook Marketplace. If you think you found your stroller, you can file a police report and try to get it back.
- Try your best to enjoy the rest of your trip. I know Disney offered us a free Disney stroller rental for the rest of our trip, but we were only there for the 24 hour party so it didn’t matter in our case. But if it helps you, take the rental and continue enjoying your trip. It is upsetting, of course, and it can really pop that magic bubble so have a good cry if you need to and then carry on
In the end, our stroller was never recovered. In fact, the pictures in this blog post are of my replacement stroller that I eventually bought. My youngest is almost five but at Disney World, he still needs to give his feet a break. So I sucked it up and bought it again.
We did have a rather magical experience due to this incident. The person working Guest Relations at Magic Kingdom that night was very helpful. He felt just awful for us because we were all crying and a mess. We mentioned that the kids autograph books were in the stroller while listing all the missing items. I didn’t think anything of it. The next afternoon, new autograph books showed up in our hotel room with a personal note from the cast member at guest relations! The new books were completely FILLED with autographs from every Disney character you could possibly imagine. It made me feel very warm and fuzzy after all we’d been through.
But that’s not even the magical part. About two years later, by completely and crazy chance, I connected with the cast member on a Disney fan group on Facebook! He was able to tell me the story from his perspective, of how heart broken he was for my kids and how he had been working a crazy long shift since it was the 24 hour party and after he got off, he went to work getting all the autographs from the correct people backstage and filed the paper work to have the books sent to our room and how he had no way of knowing if we’d already gone home or if we ever even received them and he’d always wondered how things worked out for us. It was SO AMAZING to get to talk to him and follow up and thank him personally for what he did for my kids.
Even after a sad moment at Disney, there was still some serious Disney magic!
Has you ever had an item stolen at Disney World? What did you do? Share your stories.
If you are headed to Walt Disney World in the next year, you need my new planner, Countdown to Magic!
Want to avoid this tragedy completely? Here are my tips on preventing stroller theft at Walt Disney World.