ORLANDO, FL — No doubt, here in Tampa Bay, many of us have cherished memories of trips to Disney World. After all, the most-visited theme park in the world is just a short road trip away.
But, a 26-year-old San Francisco woman has a magical memory that can probably top all of ours combined. Disney World cheerfully allowed her to redeem a long-forgotten 4-Day Park Hopper Pass from 1994 that still had one day left on it.
Chelsea Herline grew up in Michigan. Her family has a timeshare in Orlando and frequently went on trips to Disney when she was a kid. One of her favorite memories is the Disney breakfast where the characters come up and say “Hi” at your table. She also loved Splash Mountain.
During one family vacation to Disney back in 1994, Chelsea got sick and could not use the last day of her 4-Day Park Hopper pass.
Fast forward to 2016 and Chelsea is a now grown woman living in San Francisco where she is an Insight Analyst at LinkedIn. She decided to fly to Orlando to meet her parents, who were vacationing there. Her dad surprised her with her old 4-Day Park Hopper pass from 1994 that still had one day left on it. He had found the pass in the basement.
Chelsea decided to see if the 22-year-old pass was still valid. So, she went to the ticket window at Disney World and the woman working at the counter said, “Wow. I’ve never seen one this old!” The woman called over her manager, who helped her convert it from a child admission paper ticket to an electronic adult admission ticket.
“They were both super nice about it all,” Chelsea told WFLA.com.
Chelsea enjoyed her long-delayed visit to the park, especially getting to see Chip and Dale again.
“It’s a family joke that when I was little, I couldn’t stop talking about how I wanted to meet them. Then when I finally met them, I completely lost it and started sobbing,” she recalled.
“It was fun to get a picture with them so that we could compare the photos from when I was little.”
