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This tradition may have started as a joke but it soon became serious for Jeff Reitz. Can you believe that this 50-year-old man has managed to set an all-time record for consecutive Disneyland visits?

It’s a hard thing to wrap your mind around and that’s why we are so invested in this story. Jeff hails from Huntington Beach, California and he has become a celebrity of sorts now.

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He has made a whopping 2,995 visits to Disneyland in a row! As it turns out, Reitz has some reasonable rationale for starting this streak. “It started as a joke between friends when Disneyland announced they were giving an ‘Extra Disney Day’ when they announced the Leap Day 24-hour event in 2012,” Reitz told Guinness World Records when asked. The friends laughed, saying that it didn’t count as an “extra day” unless you attended every other day of the year.

“We decided to use Disneyland as a positive as we were out of work and had annual passes that had been gifted, so it was a source of free entertainment,” Reitz continued. Of course, there was no way for Jeff to know that he was about to become a record-breaker but it makes for a great story.

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Reitz’s friend eventually dropped out of the challenge and that is when he decided to continue without him. At this time, he set some ground rules for himself.

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Jeff had to stay in the park for at least an hour and he used social media to document each trip. Once he finally found a new job, he would make his visits after he got off work each day. “Then on 2012 July 1, halfway through the year, the Orange County Register reporter printed a story about making it to Day 183,” Reitz said, according to Guinness World Records. “And then the Associated Press picked up the story and it became real as I was getting contacted by newspapers and radio stations from around the globe asking for interviews.”

By the time the pandemic put a stop to his streak, he had gone every day for 8 years, 3 months, and 13 days. He’s taking a break from the daily visits but we are willing to bet that this record is not going to be broken anytime soon.

You can see more of Jeff’s Disney journey on Instagram, @disney366_.