Just got back from a quick trip

[blemon]

We surprised our 9 year old with a birthday trip to MK and Epcot this past weekend.

We stayed at PO Riverside. Never had to wait long for buses although they were really crowded at times. The pools there are great. We were in building 26 near the back. It was an accessible room. We just loved the styling. Crates and logs -- a nice touch. Felt very Disney to me.

We had reservations for breakfast and dinner at BOG. They still haven't gotten the kinks worked out. It took forever to order for breakfast and we didn't really like the food. For dinner we showed up 20 minutes early for our res and ended up waiting almost an hour to get seated. It was good to see the beast but I don't think I'll do that again.

Ride times were good. We used the touring plans in advance and then used the app in the park to help make decisions about where to go.

Everyone was amazing -- wishing the kid happy birthday and really making it a special day for her.

Epcot is gorgeous. Just beautiful. We enjoyed snacking from the kiosks and trying different frozen drinks -- it was crazy hot. Our highlights were the Pixar filmfest and the egg hunt. That was fun. Kept us all engaged searching for the eggs high and low.

We tried pin trading for the first time and had fun engaging with cast members but didn't realize the people camped out near the exit to Epcot would be rude. We didn't know they weren't cast members and will not be approaching them again. We had been having fun with that all day then saw them on our way out and my daughter got really excited to see all the pins. I think they need to make it more clear they do not work for Disney. They seemed official since we did not know. From now on we'll just trade with CMs.

 

[ErinsMommy]

Glad your trip for the most part was nice and enjoyable.

Going forward if you decide to do BOG again for either breakfast or lunch you can pre-order, that tends to make the wait time substantially less. Also for dinner, in my experience they usually don't allow you to check-in earlier than 5 minutes prior to your ADR time, but they do get behind on ADRs esp. if you went during a busy time.

As for Epcot, not sure who your referring to was rude? Were there guests there with pins and you thought they were CMs? Were they dressed like CMs or wearing name tags?

 

[blemon]

As for Epcot, not sure who your referring to was rude? Were there guests there with pins and you thought they were CMs? Were they dressed like CMs or wearing name tags?

It was probably coincidence but the three or four of them were all wearing pretty much the same thing. They were under a large umbrella for shade and had tables. They also had the large cases with the pins in the "sheets" inside. So it looked legit like Disney had set it up. I just assumed initially they were CMs because of this. I guess you can bring in a beach umbrella and a tall table if you want to -- just not a selfie stick. It was just confusing. And they were rude so we left and have learned a valuable lesson. I understand why Disney allows them to do this in the park. It just wasn't something we were expecting and we had just come from two CMs outside Norway who were with large corkboards with pins so it seemed like a similar situation to us. The sun was blinding so I wasn't paying attention to details like nametags because we were looking at the pins. One of them told me, "we aren't cast members" (she was very nice to us) -- that's when we realized and I looked more closely at them.

 

[Tink_83]

Were they selling the pins? Honestly if they were rude I'd have just gone and complained to an actual CM...

 

[Hisgirl]

Those folks don't sell the pins, but trade.

 

[avic77]

yea those people are set up to find rare pins you dont know are valuable but they wont trade just anything they are there on a mission. Some have a book for open trading and a book for serious trading. They have always been polite but firm in refusing to trade if they didnt see something on our lanyards they wanted.

 

[ErinsMommy]

IVe never seen them in all our visits - then again we don't mess with the pins so it's possible I just never noticed them

 

[Kamy04]

I know who you are talking about, we saw them last Friday.

I was suspicious of the large binders and thought they were not Disney people so we avoided them.

 

[Tink_83]

yea those people are set up to find rare pins you dont know are valuable but they wont trade just anything they are there on a mission. Some have a book for open trading and a book for serious trading. They have always been polite but firm in refusing to trade if they didnt see something on our lanyards they wanted.

So basically if they want to trade with you, keep the pin, find out the value, go on Ebay and sell it for money towards your next Disney vacation?!?

 

[AngiTN]

I've seen the Pin folks at Epcot. They are folks who just come and bring their personal collections. Not sure how they arrange it with Disney but I never thought they worked for Disney or were official in any way. I've never bothered to approach them because I know they are serious about it and we aren't, we do it for fun. So I figure we have nothing they'd want. It's a shame they are rude but I can't say I'm surprised.

 

[grumpy28]

We just returned on Tues. We were in Epcot on Sunday. We approached them and the 2 I spoke with were friendly enough. DD traded one pin and the lady said yes to the trade. I highly doubt DD had a rare pin, but I guess its possible. She had bought a haunted mansion blind box and traded one of those for a cute chip and dale dole whip pin. I asked them if they were CMs and they said no and explained that Disney let's them set up to trade,but only there. Interesting for sure, but no way would I want to spend hours on end just waiting for a trade in the FL heat! But hey, whatever makes them happy.

 

[JoAnnPan]

Have seen these traders many times. Once they wanted to trade me for a Quasi pin i was wearing (limited addition) but i said that i was not trading that one...i was interested in a Belle pin they had and they said if i went in the pin store right there and bought the specific pin they requested they would trade...so basically i bought a pin for them and traded. Could have just paid them 12.99 for the pin i wanted.
They definitely know a good pin when they see it!!