CNN
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There are Disney Park regulars, and then there’s Jeff Reitz. The 50-year-old California native visited Disneyland every day for 2,995 days between 2012 and March 2020, earning him a shiny new Guinness World Record for most consecutive trips to the theme park.
Reitz adventure started a decade ago when he found himself with a Disneyland annual pass and, due to being recently unemployed, a bunch of unanticipated free time. One visit turned into another, and pretty soon he was documenting his daily sojourns to thousands of followers under the social media handle Disney366 – a nod to the number of days in 2012, a leap year.
His visits were curtailed by the pandemic in early 2020, but history had already been made. (After all, one doesn’t just haunt the same place every day for eight years and not become something of a celebrity.) Researchers at Guinness found out about Reitz’s feat, and recently contacted him about the creation of a new record.
Reitz talked to CNN about his favorite moments in the park, and what made the experience something worth returning for, day after day.
Reitz has a history with Disneyland. The park already felt like an old friend by the time he started his streak in 2012. “I grew up in Huntington Beach, and my family used to come several times a year,” he tells CNN.
“It’s a nice place to walk around and chat with people. The park really is alive. I’ve got to see so many things change.”
Plus, the cost was fairly low, especially by Disney standards.
“One criticism I get is people saying, ‘Oh, that must have cost so much money.’ I live about 20 minutes away, and with an annual pass that also covers parking, a year of daily visits costs about $1,400. It’s a lot, but it’s not what people think.”
Even when Reitz returned to work, he made a daily trip from his job to Disneyland, and then home again.
“Part of what made it fun was I tried to mix things up and do things differently each time,” he says. “The only consistent thing was, I would post a check-in on social media, and try to post one image of the park per day.”
Back in 2012, Instagram wasn’t quite the cultural giant it is now, and smartphones weren’t nearly as smart. Instead, Reitz captured the first few years of his visit on a…
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