On June 11th SeaWorld Orlando reopened after being closed for an extended period of time due to the Covid-19 pandemic.  When I heard about the reopening date I wanted to go over and check on their new processes and of course, see how those precious pressed penny machines were doing.

Shortly after I got into the park I noticed that many of the penny machines were missing.  It then became apparent after I eventually did come across one of the machines that SeaWorld was converting their machines over to pre-loaded penny versions that cost $1.  We’ve reviewed this change with Disney Parks and now it seems like SeaWorld is the next park to make the conversion.  Prior to the park closure, they had a total of 25 pressed penny machines, but on my first visit back only 10 were available.  Stay tuned as I’ll be going back in a few weeks to check on the rest of the machines when they come back so we can review those new machines.

But all was not lost on this trip.  In one of the gift shops I wandered into just to see the special reopening merch, I actually came across a new pressed penny booklet.

Since I don’t use these booklets for my own collection I often forget to look for them at different attractions or parks.  However, I do still purchase them as a separate collection and have way too many of these in large totes I keep in my office.  This one just ended up catching my eye as I walked by the display and after referring to my booklet collection I confirmed it was at least new to me.  I don’t know exactly how “new” this is, but it can’t be much more than a year old at the most since the last Seaworld booklet I purchased was in 2018.

The booklet also had a nice pressed penny design on the front cover.  It is similar to other designs throughout the park but is unique for the booklet.

Even though I don’t store pennies in these booklets I still couldn’t resist picking this up and added it to my collection.  I will be interested to come back in a few weeks and hope all the machines eventually return.  In the Disney parks, none of the designs were changed after their conversion but I’m hoping that SeaWorld decides to release some new designs.  They haven’t really had anything new in quite a while, and I’m also kind of surprised they never released one of the larger 8-design touch screen machines somewhere.  But I’ll be sure to check back and share whatever changes take place.