August 2018 - "Best Day Ever" Trip - Day 4
8/13 - Day 4
Cast
Me - Jen
DH - Joe
DS - 5
DD - 2
Grammie - my mom
Grandpa - my dad
K - my best friend
J - her husband
J - their daughter, 5; my son’s best friend
X - their son, 2
K&J had a one bedroom suite, so they had a full kitchen and decided they would make breakfast Monday morning. After eggs and sausage in their room, we took the bus over to Animal Kingdom. I know some people are not fans of the park, but it is definitely one of my favorites. I love animals and I love the theming and the energy there.
We started our day out with a safari ride, and got to see most of the animals pretty well. I was happy to see the African Wild Dogs on the safari, I think they’re beautiful. After our safari, we took a walk on the Gorilla Falls Exploration Trail (formerly Pangani Exploration Trail?). Our group ended up getting separated, but DS and I took our time and he got to have some great interactions with some of the CMs on the trail, asking questions and learning about the animals. We had a particularly great interaction with the CM in the underwater hippo viewing area...they talked about hippo poop...being a 5 year old, he thought that was awesome. Next up was Festival of the Lion King. DS loves that show, particularly the Tumble Monkeys. DD was less than a fan. DH ended up taking her out...for days afterwards she kept telling us “lion show loud. I don’t like it.” I think it was actually the announcer voice at the beginning before teh show started.
Our family had never been over to Pandora because it opened after our last trip, but my parents love it. We head over that way and grabbed lunch at Satu’li which was delicious! Na’vi River Journey was visually beautiful and the kids really enjoyed it. I loved the details of everything. We head back to Africa and took the train over to Rafiki’s Planet Watch. We all enjoyed seeing the vet clinic area and the kids loved the affection section. DD, in particular, did not want to stop brushing the goats. We all needed a snack at that point, so we grabbed Dole Whips with rum (for the grownups) and Mickey Premium bars for the kids and settled in on the seating area between the store and Tamu Tamu refreshments. DD fell asleep in her stroller. And then it began to look very ominous. We ducked into Mombasa Marketplace and the skies opened up. J, K, J and X ended up heading back to the hotel after a little wait. We waited a little bit longer and then as it started letting up, we put on some ponchos and head over to Asia. The rain stopped and waited for lightning in the area to let up so that they would reopen the Maharajah Jungle Trek. When they did, the 6 of us took a lovely walk and were treated to the mother tiger and her two youngsters frolicking, jumping on each other and just generally being exceptionally active. DS asked a zillion questions of the CM by the tigers and she just answered them and gave him even more to think about. It was great.
Afterwards we head over to Restaurantasaurus to get something that I was sure the kids would like (they hadn’t eaten a whole lot of their hot dogs at Satu’li). They split a chicken nuggets meal and the rest of us got regular “park fare”, burgers and fries. We rode the Triceratops Spin after dinner and then DS requested that we go back to Pandora to see what it looked like at night. The Na’vi River Journey had a 10 minute wait (it was about 8:15 at this point and the park closed at 8:30) so we hopped in line for DS. After spending a few minutes marveling at the way Pandora lights up at night, we head back to the hotel.