Hey Disney friends! If you’re headed to Walt Disney World for the first time this year (or just the first time in FOREVER!), I’ve put together this scavenger hunt full of unique items to look out for, along with some fun facts about each one! I tried to include many things from Disney history that are overlooked or not widely known, and some of my favorite Magic Kingdom secrets. You can use them to impress your travel companions, have something to do in line to keep occupied (Parents, this is GREAT for kids!), or just to add a little extra magic to your trip if you’re a frequent visitor to the Magic Kingdom.
Here is just a sample from the first page of the 20-item hunt, scroll down for the FREE printable version!
Some helpful hints:
- You can find the items in any order
- They are all things you can spot as you tour the Magic Kingdom as usual, adding some extra magic along the way – no need to use this guide as a touring plan (unless you want to!)
- Some items are easier than others to locate… this is so our littlest adventurers can join in the fun!
- I’ve included a few bonus fun facts for some of the items to add a little extra pixie dust
- I purposely did NOT include photos of each item in this post because I didn’t want to make it too easy, but if you can’t find something, feel free to reach out to me here or on instagram @disneycicerone and I’d love to help!
Grab the printable version HERE for your youngest explorers to use while in the parks, bookmark this page, or screenshot/save the list to your phone for easy carrying!
(Note: This list was updated in 2024 to adjust for the closure of Splash Mountain)
Have a magical day, Disney friends!
Magic Kingdom
- Main Street U.S.A. – Changing Times Chandeliers
Osium “Osh” Popham founded his modest Emporium on Main Street U.S.A. in 1863, when gas light fixtures were all the rage with their upward-facing lamps. As his store expanded and grew more prosperous, he added new chandeliers to his additions that were wired for electricity, but also retained some upward-facing gas lamps due to the unreliability of electric lights. Finally, in 1901, Osh expanded his store one final time to include the Emporium Gallery, this time installing all electric downward-facing lights in a sweeping Edwardian style in vogue in Europe at the time. As you tour the Emporium, enjoy your walk through time and note each kind of chandelier! Side note: Osh Popham was a character (played by Burl Ives) in the Disney movie “Summer Magic” from 1963, and you can often hear the song “Flitterin'” from this feature film in the background music on Main Street.
2. Main Street U.S.A.- Two Non-Forced Perspective Buildings
There are two buildings on Main Street USA that do not use the 1- 7/8 – 1/2 scale forced perspective. One is Tony’s Town Square restaurant building, which needs to be tall enough to block the view of the Contemporary while in the parks and was therefore built with all its floors true-to-size. Another is the Town Square Firehouse, which stands a full three stories because the original plans for the parks included an apartment for Walt’s family like its counterpart in Disneyland. As you may know, Walt sadly passed away before the opening of Walt Disney World, which made the apartment unnecessary. But as construction was already underway, the building was completed full-scale.
3. Main Street U.S.A. Castle Hub – Land Survey Marker
These round metal markers with a global symbol and Mickey ears are what surveyors use when plotting infrastructure and utilities. They can be found in all of the Disney parks! Historically, Disney also used the top of Cinderella’s castle as a triangulation point because it could be seen from any location and had an established elevation.
4. Cinderella Castle Mural – Herb Ryman (Imagineer/Designer) and John Hench (Imagineer/Animator)
The footman’s face is Imagineer Herb Ryman, who designed both Sleeping Beauty Castle in Disneyland and Cinderella Castle in WDW. The man standing directly behind him is a caricature of Imagineer and animator John Hench, who designed many attractions including Space Mountain and New Orleans Square, and who was also the official portrait artist of Mickey Mouse. While you’re there, have a quick peek at Anastasia and Drizella… they are green with envy and red with anger, respectively.
5. Prince Charming Regal Carrousel – A Solid Wood Horse
Some of the horses on this 1917 “Liberty Carousel” are made from solid maple wood, and some are fiberglass replicas. Find an original by giving the horse a gentle thump!
6. Fantasyland – Peanuts, Shells, and Horseshoe Prints
Disney often embeds objects and prints into the ground to create atmosphere and add to the story. So keep looking down, you never know what you might find! While you’re at it, enjoy the resilient asphalt below your feet… it’s a blend of asphalt concrete and rubber that helps fight fatigue and aching joints and is found all over the Disney parks!
7. Winnie the Pooh Tree – Hidden Nautilus
You can find a nod to the now-extinct 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea submarine ride in these two locations. The tree itself used to be the centerpiece of a Pooh play area which used to sit on top of where the lagoon from the submarine ride used to be. The tree was relocated in the Fantasyland remodel, but this relic remains. There is also a similar Nautilus in the rock work of Under the Sea – Journey of the Little Mermaid, which currently stands in the site of the old lagoon (and is why the queue was designed with water as the centerpiece!)
8. Seven Dwarves Mine Train – Hidden Mickeys
Look for a hidden mickey in the queue wall, and another one behind one of the dwarf’s heads in the mine, created by three diamonds. You may also notice the vultures look extra menacing… that’s because they were repurposed from the now-defunct Snow White’s Scary Adventures ride, and are not to scale with the rest of the ride’s characters. The scene at the end of the attraction is also all repurposed from that original attraction.
9. Liberty Square – Kepple Heart Sign
Kepple was the name of Walt’s great-great-grandfather, born in 1776 in Ireland. Liberty Square itself is a progression through time, beginning in 1770s at the Haunted Mansion and progressing all the way around the Rivers of America to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, ending in the 1880s.
10. Liberty Square – “Two, If By Sea” Lanterns
From the famous Longfellow poem describing Paul Revere’s midnight ride, two lanterns can be spotted in an upper window. This was a failsafe signal placed in the window of Boston’s Old North Church in case Paul Revere did not successfully deliver his message, and it remains a stalwart reminder of when the British came by sea.
11. Liberty Square – 13 Colony Lanterns
The Liberty Tree is a symbol of freedom for the early colonists, and at 38 tons and over 100 years old, it’s the largest living thing in the Magic Kingdom. 13 lanterns can be found here, each symbolizing one of the original 13 colonies. While you’re at it, have a look at the Liberty Bell replica, created from the same casting as the original Liberty Bell.
12. Liberty Square – Not *Quite* American Flags
Look closer at the American flags in Liberty Square… none of them are actual current American flags. The reason is there are laws about what you can do and not do with a real American flag, like when you need to lower it to half-mast or retire it at the end of the day. To get around this, Disney has made each decorative flag not a true American flag so they can fly them as they like. The only real American flag flying in the parks in the one you see when you first enter the park.
13. Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, & Liberty Belle Riverboat – Beacon Joe
The Imagineers used the same audio-animatronics character for multiple attractions to save from reinventing the wheel, so Beacon Joe has the same face in all three locations. Keep a sharp eye out in the jail cell, the banquet table, and the alligator swamp!
14. Haunted Mansion Queue – Constance Hatchaway’s Engagement Ring
Constance is the star of the Haunted Mansion story, she haunts the attic after marrying and subsequently doing away with her husbands one by one. In the attic scene, you can see she gains a string of pearls around her neck in each portrait as she gets wealthier after each husband. The hatboxes on the right side across from axe-wielding Constance is where she stores the severed heads of her previous spouses. Also note: After seeing Constance, you then fall out of the attic window, turning backward during the fall, and become a ghost yourself. That’s why the caretaker and his dog are so afraid… they see YOU.
15. Haunted Mansion – Good Ol’ Fred Tombstone
This is referring to Fred Joerger, who was an Imagineer who made many of the original models for Disneyland’s attractions, including the steamboat Mark Twain, Main Street, the Matterhorn, and Sleeping Beauty Castle, but that’s not all. He became the “resident rock expert” as he created the rock work for the Jungle Cruise and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, the original waterfall in the Polynesian, and pretty much all of the rock work for the Walt Disney World opening in 1971.
16. Haunted Mansion Pet Cemetery – Dearly Departed Mr. Toad
Poor Mr. Toad of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride rests in peace here. His ride was replaced by Winnie the Pooh, and in that ride, you can spy our beloved amphibian handing over the deed to the property to Owl.
17. Carousel of Progress – Mary Poppins Robins
The birds in the Spring scene are the same ones who whistled along with Mary Poppins, they were repurposed for this 1964 World’s Fair attraction after filming wrapped. The father who narrates in this show is voiced by Jean Shepherd, of Christmas Story fame. Uncle Orville is the same voice actor as Bugs Bunny, Mel Blanc. And keep an eye out in the Christmas scene… there are multiple hidden Mickeys in the room!
18. Adventureland – Bwana Bob Merch Cart
This cart is named after Bob Hope’s 1963 movie Call Me Bwana.
19. Jungle Cruise – Casablanca Plane
The Lockheed Model 12 Electra Junior airplane in the Magic Kingdom in the Jungle Cruise is the actual plane from Casablanca. Imagineers did some research on its serial number and found it was owned by Warner during the time Casablanca was filmed. While most of the movie was shot on a soundstage with a fake airplane, there is a shot of this particular aircraft taking off at the end of the movie.
20. Big Thunder Mountain – Balancing Bobcat
On one of the lift hills, look down to your left and find a bobcat balanced on top of a cactus escaping some wild pigs. This is a scene from Disney’s True Life Adventure documentary film The Living Desert. It was also featured in Mine Train Through Nature’s Wonderland, which was a slow-moving train ride in Disneyland that Big Thunder Mountain eventually replaced. (Note: You can see the bobcat more easily from the Walt Disney World Railroad.)
BONUS TRIVIA: Seven Seas Lagoon – The Resorts that Never Were
To create the Seven Seas Lagoon (the lake in front of the Magic Kingdom), they relocated over seven million cubic yards of earth to dig the lagoon and used it to cover the utilidoors (the Cast Member-only lower-level of Walt Disney World). It got its name because the originally planned resorts around the lagoon were supposed to be from places located near the seven seas… among them an Asian, Venetian, and Persian Resort. While all three were eventually scrapped, the Venetian never got off the ground mainly because the swampland where it was to be built was too soggy, and every test piling Imagineers sent into the ground disappeared entirely.
I had SO much fun putting this scavenger hunt together! There are thousands more Disney secrets, hidden Mickeys, and Easter Eggs, and it was hard to choose just a few to share with you all, but I hope this list brings a little extra joy to your vacation!
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