First time trip to WDW next May - with an 11 year old and a 2 year old. Where do you leave pushchairs whilst queuing for rides? Also, how secure is leaving all the bags with the pushchair (obviously not handbag or anything valuable, but thinking things like the lunch bag, changing bag etc)
I presume you mean stroller by “pushchair”? (I haven’t heard that term before.)
Anyhow, there is usually an area (or areas) within each major ride area that has stroller parking. They are fairly well marked, so you shouldn’t have too much trouble locating such areas.
As far as leaving items? For non-valuable items, I think it is fairly safe. I would be more nervous about the squirrels taking something than humans, though. So if you are leaving food, etc., you should keep it well secured from the animals! Keep things strapped TO the stroller if you can as extra protection. And a general tip: Because your stroller will be in a sea of hundreds of others potentially, I would find some way to easily identify your stroller. We, for example, used to tie this big white gaudy ribbon to the handle. It was easy to spot that way.
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Yes it’s a stroller.
Thanks. Makes sense. In fact, it is probably a better term than “stroller”. I just hadn’t heard it before and wasn’t certain if it was a stroller versus a wheelchair, etc.
I don’t know if OP is in the UK but it’s a very common term here.
So, would it be fair to say that a pushchair is a TYPE of stroller? Another type would be a pram? Or is it really just interchangeable to use pushchair for stroller, regardless of type?
We don’t use stroller at all, mainly buggy or pushchair. We do use pram as well but really a pram is different.
Pushchair.
Pram.
Got it. I knew what the pram was specifically. Here in the States, we generally would call either a stroller…although the pram style isn’t something you’d see too often, since these days most have a convertible system where the infant carrier for a car plugs into the main stroller (pushchair!).
Anyhow, I like to learn the various terms! Thanks for humoring me.
No problem! You don’t see a lot of proper prams here either anymore.
++ @ryan1 … I recommend a compact, lighter weight (umbrella) stroller to make it easier to get on and off of Disney transportation. Best thing I’ve seen for locating your stroller is a flashing LED light cube that you can toss into a mesh compartment.
I did see a very tearful Mother at AK last week yelling at her DH about something valuable being stolen from their stroller. I would encourage anyone to make use of package pickup and use some sort of lock or tether on the stroller bag, just in case.
As a Mexican, I am completely amazed/horrified/traumatized at the amount of stuff people leave unattended in their pushchairs at WDW. The pushchair itself would get stolen here, not to mention anything in it -including, sadly, the child. But it’s so safe there! Everything is so safe!
Now, having said that a few tips:
Don’t put too much on the back because those things tip over so easily.
I’m Mexican. Don’t leave anything there. Don’t! What are you thinking? Don’t!
There are googleplex pushchairs in WDW and all of them are identical to yours. Every. Single. One. As @ryan1 mentioned, mark yours big and bold!
You can rent them in WDW if you don’t want to import your own. The only advantage to bringing your own is at the airport and to/from trams/buses, maybe the fact that you know the pushchair better than a rental.
Always remember that there is a special circle of hell for those that use their pushchair as weapons. Dante describes it in his Divine Comedy. Honest. Look it up.
Have a great trip!
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We never leave anything in the stroller that we couldn’t bear to lose. We do leave a small cooler type snack bag (with everything in ziplocs - the squirrels are amazing at getting to food if they can smell it) and the stroller raincover but that’s about it.
A few trips ago I bought DD a balloon in Magic Kingdom. We took the monorail to Epcot mid-afternoon and decided to ride Soarin’ before heading back to the Boardwalk. Came back to the stroller only to find that someone had stolen her balloon, which was tied in a double knot to the snack tray. DD was absolutely heartbroken! She was crying so hard supervisor CM came up to see what the problem was, and gave us a voucher for a new balloon, plus another for a sweet treat to make her feel better. This did cheer her up, but she was still talking about her pink Mickey balloon weeks later, wondering why someone would take it even though they knew it wasn’t theirs… Some people really are scum.
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That’s just it. Don’t leave anything valuable. But people aren’t generally looking to steal diapers or a burp cloth or some granola bars, that kind of thing. (Although, if your diaper bag is somewhat expensive, I’d be concerned about that!)
Know that things get stolen, even in WDW. It’s rare but it does happen.
Here’s what we did last year. I had a largish purse that I kept with me for anything that would have ruined our trip to lose. Mostly expensive or hard to replace/sentimental things. Then the other stuff (baby wipes, spare clothes, water bottles, snacks, etc) went into a backpack that lived in the basket of the stroller. We used a bike lock to chain the backpack to the stroller frame, and we also looped the bike lock through one of the back wheels when we parked the stroller. It makes it a bit harder to move the stroller. This wouldn’t deter someone determined to steal but it does discourage crimes of opportunity. When possible, we asked the CM around where the best place was for the stroller to minimize the chance that they’d need to move it. If they did need to move it, though, they could do so by lifting the back wheels.
Also, we kept a small collapsable shopping bag with us. It was useful for things that we picked up along the way and were too bulky to fit in the backpack (like the stuffed animal we got DD and she wanted to keep with her, or leftovers from dinner).
And while I’m giving unsolicited advice, it was great to have a plastic stroller cover. It meant that we could leave our stroller out in the rain in stroller parking without worrying about it staying wet for days or our stuff getting soaked.
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