Top 6 of DW 2009-Watch for those Hidden Mickeys!

              Onward with our countdown.............Number 4!  Hidden Mickeys!  Say What?

The Disney official history goes like this: Hidden Mickeys started in the late 1980’s in Epcot as an inside joke among the Imagineers. Hiding Mickey around WDW was just plain fun! However, Jim Hill (jimhillmedia.com) believes in this "unofficial history": Hidden Mickeys were born as the Imagineers were designing Epcot in the late 1970's and early 1980's. At that time, Disney management felt that the characters belonged in the Magic Kingdom only. The Imagineers disagreed and began slipping Mickeys into Epcot! I suspect that Mickey Mouse designs that were previously in place in WDW (and Disneyland) also became known as Hidden Mickeys. Because of the popularity of HM’s, Imagineers are encouraged to place them in new construction.

     There are tons of "hidden Mickeys" to be found all over Disney World and the kids and I had a ton of fun trying to find them.  One evening we were too tired to head back to the parks, so we decided to take the hidden mickey tour that our resort, Wilderness Lodge, created.  We were tasked to find 12 different hidden mickeys on property and they ranged from the lobby to the rooms to the restaurant to the pool.  We spent 2 hours finding hidden mickeys.  Some were easy:

          But many were pretty hard, like the one on the ceiling of the bar on the horse's rear.  Huh?  Don't ask- we had to get help from the bartender on that one!  As difficult as it was, the kids and I had so much fun doing it.  And the last couple of days were dedicated to finding mickeys everywhere.  Some were easy, like on the drains all over the world, others were hard to see, like the 3 plates in the Haunted Mansion set up to look like Mickey's head.  The obvious ones are not considered "hidden", but my kids didn't care. See if you can see some of the mickeys in the following pictures:

        There are websites & books dedicated to the art of finding the hidden mickeys.  What I found is that if I was too busy trying to find a mickey on a ride, I didn't get to relax and enjoy the ride so much. So I stopped.  The hunt, while fun, would be something we can save for a later trip- when the kids are older....much older.