Month: February 2019

Mickey’s 90th Celebration Pressed Pennies

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Back on November 18, 1928 Mickey Mouse made his debut and things have never been the same.  Walt Disney has a famous quote “I only hope that we never lose sight of one thing…that it was all started with a mouse.”  If only Walt could see what has become of his little friend now I’m sure it would have exceeded even his expectations.

Now here we are celebrating his 90th birthday, and Disney has extended this celebration to all aspect of the park.  There are special merchandise, cupcakes, and even some special costumes for the characters.  But the most exciting release (at least for me) was that they had released five special Pressed Pennies.

I just happened to come across the first penny as I was visiting Disney Springs.  My daughters have become obsessed with Pin Trading so I usually visit the Pin Trader store to see if there are any new pins they may like.  This is also a place that currently has 5 penny machines.  As I walked by one of the machines I noticed a new design.

 

I immediately pressed a few copies of the penny, took my pictures of the machine and posted them online for the collecting community.  Then we found out that there were other sightings of similar new designs popping up all over property.  So we now had a new plan for the day.

We then drove over to Epcot and into the Mouse Gear store which is where another collector mentioned they had seen one of the new designs.

 

Sure enough the new design was added to the machine that has the dated 2019 penny from earlier this year.  This was another nice design with Mickey inside the Zero of the 90 for his celebration.

The next stop was just a quick Monorail ride over to the Magic Kingdom.  Rumors were there had been two new designs released here.  First was just after the main entrance to the park at the Newsstand.

 

This is probably my favorite design of the new set.  I always liked Steamboat Willie Mickey and we don’t get many pressed designs with him on it.  After using this machine we headed down Main Street and over towards Adventureland.

Just past the Skipper Canteen restaurant there is a store called the Island Supply.  Just before that is a place known as the Verandah Breezeway but this is basically where the restrooms are located in this section of the park.

 

Inside this area is always packed with people but along one of the walls is where the penny machine can be found.  The penny here had a new 2019 design with Mickey in the Zero.

The fifth and last penny was found the next over at Hollywood Studios.  Unfortunately the studios closes early  so it took a few days before I was able to get over there and visit the machine.

 

Back near the Disney Junior and Star Wars Launch Bay area of the park is a little place called The Studio Store.  This penny has both Mickey and Minnie looking like they are ready to Celebrate.

We have all kept our eyes open for any additional designs, but so far it’s only been these five.  They make for a nice set, and as always was fun to hunt around property looking for them.  As with the other 2019 coins these were located in some unusual machine locations, but that was all part of the adventure.

These pennies will definitely not be around too long so make sure you try and get a set before too long.  Over the next couple years there are lots of special anniversaries at the Florida parks so hopefully this is something they continue releasing to help Celebrate the magic of Disney.

Replaced Animal Kingdom 20th Anniversary Penny Designs

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In 2018 Disney’s Animal Kingdom was celebrating its 20th anniversary and had released some special pressed penny designs.  Well now that it is 2019 the anniversary has come and gone which means those 20th anniversary designs are also no longer available.

At the Outpost Shop located at the entrance to the Animal Kingdom before even the security checkpoints is where the first machine was found.

The machine cabinet has remained the same, only the penny designs inside and the marquee have been changed.

I should rephrase that a bit.  The penny designs are actually still the same but now without the 20th anniversary banner on each.  Now the designs just say Disney’s Animal Kingdom and the Disney Conservation Fund.

The pennies have images of Russell, Doug and Kevin from the movie Up!

The second set of pennies that have changed was relocated at the Mombasa Marketplace.

This store has lots of unique African inspired artwork and even some instruments that my two daughters always enjoy creating music with.

Just like the other set, these designs are the same main image as before but the 20th anniversary banner has been removed.

This set is from The Lion King and includes images of Simba, Timon and Pumbaa.

As you can see these are not major changes, and the casual pressed penny collector probably wouldn’t notice.  But for some any one interested in trying to acquire all Disney pennies the 20th anniversary set may be a little hard to find now.  Hopefully you were able to pick up a set before they were retired.

Lunar New Year Pressed Penny Set – China Pavilion in Epcot

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Chinese New Year commonly known as the Lunar New Year is a festival celebrating the new year on the traditional Chinese calendar.  For 2019 the first day of the Lunar New Year will be on February 5th initiating the Year of the Pig.

Previous years have included the Year of the Rat, Sheep, Ox and a few others as these are on a 12 year cycle and will repeat.  Year of the Pig happens to be the 12th in the cycle and will not be celebrated again until 2031.

Over on the West Coast in Disney California Adventure they have a Lunar New Year festival with food booths and special entertainment to celebrate.  However on the East Coast in Epcot there is an ever rotating cycle of festivals going on all throughout the year.  At this time the Festival of the Arts is in full swing.

The Festival has plenty of food booths and also some tents setup with Disney artwork for purchase.

Oswald has become a new favorite of mine.  Hopefully he appears a little more often in the parks.

On a recent visit to check out some of the food options at the Festival of the Arts we made our way over to the China Pavilion.  The line for the food booth here is always busy as they usually some very popular items.  We decided to head back into the pavilion instead as I had heard about a new penny machine.

Past the Nine Dragons restaurant and quick service Lotus Blossom Cafe is the main gift shop called the House of Good Fortunate.

Just inside the doors used to be a 3 design penny machine but that has been removed.  Now in its place is a new 12 design penny machine.

The cool thing about this machine is that the designs are all of the different animals representing the 12 year cycle of the Chinese / Lunar New Year.  But with a slight twist.  Each animal is represented by a Disney character of the same animal.  Year of the Rat has Remy from Ratatouille, Year of the Tiger has Tigger from Winnie the Pooh, and Year of the Monkey has Abu from Aladdin.  What a really fun set of designs.

Please take notice of the cost for this set.  The cost is still $1 for an individual penny, but if you are like me and want the full set it will run you $10 (yikes!).

The machine does have samples of each pressed penny inside so you can see what the finished coin will look like in person.

Photo credit: parkpennies.com

Something I found out after I got home and was cataloging these new coins is that they had already been available in the Shanghai Disney Resort.  Above is a picture from the parkpennies.com which is a great resource I use for my Disneyland collection.  The images are the same but obviously the park name has been altered to Walt Disney World.  Now I feel like I need to collect some of these Shanghai Disney pressed coins as they really have some nice designs available.  But that will be a project for another day.

Back at the Festival of the Arts.  I will say that I really enjoy all the art work, and some of the food items are really pretty to look but none of them really stood out as a favorite.  I’ll have to go back another day and try some different food booths and see if I can find something else a little more enjoyable.  The Flower and Garden Festival will be here soon and that is one of my favorites, and maybe a new pressed penny machine will make an appearance as well.

2019 WDW Dated Pressed Quarter Change

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In a bit a strange move, this past weekend the 2019 pressed quarter design of Minnie Mouse that was at the All-Star Music resort has been removed.  So far it hasn’t been moved to another location (although we are keeping an eye out for this).

The machine is still located just outside the Note’Able Games arcade, but now has a new 2019 design.

The design is the same Fantasmic / Maleficent Dragon image that is on a penny in the Rock around the Shop.

Technically this makes 17 designs released as part of the 2019 dated set.  But with the Minnie Mouse quarter design missing, there are still just 16 designs available for pressing.  Hopefully you got one of the Minnie Mouse designs before it was removed.  This may make for a limited release design and something not everyone would have been able to acquire in the month or so it was available.

Coco Pressed Pennies – Mexico Pavilion in Epcot

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In Epcot’s world showcase one of the more popular pavilions is Mexico.  Whether this is due to the tequila bar La Cava, Mexican food which I personally enjoy, or if like my daughters it’s the slow-moving boat ride attraction.

When the pavilion initially opened the boat ride was called El Rio del Tiempo (The River of Time), and took visitors through various scenes in Mexican history.

Then in 2007 the attraction was changed to the Grand First Tour featuring The Three Caballeros.  For those of you that may not have seen the 1944 Disney animated movie the Three Caballeros are Donald Duck, Jose Carioca, and Panchito Pistoles.  It’s still a slow-moving boat ride, but the Three Caballeros are supposed to perform a concert but Donald is off on his own exploring Mexico.  It’s a cute little ride and my kids absolutely love it.  On most visits to Epcot we hop on at least 2 or 3 times.  But we will get back to the ride shortly.

The part I always loved about this pavilion is how you are inside, but it’s designed to look like you are outside in a Mexican market.  There are building exteriors around the perimeter of the pavilion, and various carts selling all sorts of beautiful art, as well as t-shirts, sombrero and plenty of Disney merchandise.

I brought up about the change to the boat ride in 2007 for a reason.  With the popularity of the 2017 Pixar animated movie Coco, there have been rumors swirling around that the Grand Fiesta tour ride would be changed / updated to revolve around the Coco story and characters.  So far nothing has been confirmed by Disney, but maybe one step in that direction has to do with a new pressed penny machine that was just released inside the Pavilion.

Located outside La Tienda Encantada store (also by the exit to the boat ride) is where there used to be a 3-design penny machine.  That was removed and replaced with a new 8-design touch screen machine.

The designs on these new pennies are all characters from the Coco movie.

The images include Miguel with his Guitar, Ernesto del La Cruz, Hector, Abuelita, Mama Coco, Dante the Dog, Abuelita pinching Miguel’s cheeks, and Miguel sitting with his face painted.  The details on these coins are really nice and made me want to watch the movie again.  These characters were really great and the story in the movie is fantastic.

I mentioned that there used to be 3-design penny machine here that initially I thought had been removed completely.  However after we wandered around the pavilion a bit and contemplated eating at the San Angel Inn we found the machine.

It’s now located just outside restaurant near the check-in area.

The designs have not changed, but it’s nice to still have this machine available.

I guess only time will tell on whether we will get an updated Coco boat ride inside the Pavilion.  But until then this is still a fun place to visit and just spend some time checking out all the details.  Plus there’s free air conditioning inside which is a blessing in the middle of the Florida summer.