I was lined up at the rope, already through the Animal Kingdom gates, and raring to go by 8:55. And at 9:05, after the ropes were moved and a short walk to the Kilimanjaro Safari, I was walking right onto a truck with 0 wait time. I even got an edge seat! Highlights of the safari were definitely the rhinos, the lions, the elephant and the giraffe so close to the car that I could have reached out to touch it!
I left the safari and had french toast for breakfast; with maple syrup! It was delicious, and the perfect taste of home to start off my day perfectly! :) I wandered from the Africa area to the Asia area to ride Expedition Everest; DAK's roller coaster. I managed to get into the single rider's line twice and on the train twice in about 10 minutes! So much fun. Looking at my picture afterward, I was clearly more excited than my fellow travelers to be going down the big hill ;)
I went to the Flights of Wonder show after that, which was essentially a comedy sketch with birds of prey as guest stars in the show. It was spectacular, and I was in the second row and was able to see all the animals up close. My favorite joke of the show was a parrot who could do math; the trainer would ask what is 1 + 3, or 7 - 3, or 12 / 3, and the parrot would answer 4! Clearly the parrot only knew one answer, and the trainer explained that instead of knowing math, the cue was the word "three". Every time the parrot heard it, he'd say "four". The trainer then told us that even words that sound like three will work; and asked the parrot, "What you would say if you hit your golf ball over a tree?" To which the parrot replied, "Fore!" (I laughed!)
After the show, I walked the Jungle Trek trail and saw some beautiful tigers napping in the shade. Then I went to a few of the merchandise stores in the middle of the park to wait for Emily and Hudson to arrive. I chatted with a Pin Trading guy who was working and got the scoop on the best way to pin trade at Disney (pin trading is huge there - there are pins that cast members wear on a lanyard and are not available just for sale. You need to trade for them. Apparently the best way to do this is to buy official Disney trading pins on ebay for cheap!) I called Dad on Facetime to let him know to start searching!
I was also looking for a Belle button in a box on one of the counters, when I was offered assistance by the ladies working there. Little did I know that assistance would mean dumping them all out!I wasn't able to find it, but I bought the four other princess pins in the hopes that somewhere I'll find the Belle one to match the set :)
When Hudson and Emily arrived at about 12:30, we started by going back up to the Asia area for lunch at the Yak & Yeti. I had sweet and sour chicken, which turned out to be surprisingly good! I've also decided that eventually regretting not buying the yummy-looking desserts on every menu will be worse than not finishing part of a meal. So I also ordered the triple-chocolate mousse; it turned out to be be more of a double-choclate-in-three-layers pudding, but it was chocolate and had whipped cream, so it was wonderful :)
The three of us walked down to Camp Minnie-Mickey, another section of the park for the Festival of the Lion King; a live musical show with acrobats and dancers and huge animatronic animals. It's Emily's favorite live show in all of Disney World, and I can see why. It was absolutely incredible, and I don't know why I don't remember doing it with my family. Sometimes you miss these things because you don't know just how good they are! :) They are building a brand new stage for it in the Africa area and I'll be excited to see it when it's finished!
We trekked over to Dinoland, stopped in the restaurant where Hudson works (Restaurantosaurus!) and got in line for Dinosaur - a ride based on the Disney Dinosaur movie from 2000. Originally, this ride was apparently just kind of like a travel back in time adventure with scary dinos jumping out at you, and then when the movie came out they refurbished it with the movie's theme. Every time someone I know here talks about this ride though, they always talk about how scary it is! And every time I see one of those ride photos with my friends in it, everyone looks horrified as the camera snaps the picture. So, it was about a third of the way through that I thought that I would rather not see what was happening around me. I held onto my handles, closed my eyes, and focused on breathing knowing that nothing could actually hurt me in there. So as long as I stayed calm, I'd be okay. I saw the flash of the camera through my eyelids and felt everyone in my car flinch but still kept my eyes shut until we were safely back at the loading dock. I wasn't having it.
We went from Dinoland back up to Asia to hope on Expedition Everest. The single rider line only took us about 10 minutes, and we even all got on the same train :) I'm loving this single rider thing they are doing now - going on Everest three times in one day is unheard of unless you want to spend all day in line for it, or waiting for your fast pass time to come up! I love it; especially since I've been park hopping on my own so often! I wish they had space to put a single rider line in a Space Mountain, although I would probably spend wayyyy to much time there! ;)
The rain started as we got off the ride, and I thought it was time to head home... but nope! Emily and Hudson wanted to hit Magic Kingdom... and who was I to say no?! We hopped on the Contemporary & Polynesian guest bus because MK is such a short walk from where the bus drops us at the Contemporary. However, on the way to MK the rain started to pour, so we decided to go to the Polynesian Resort and get Dole Whip. The Poly is right across the lake from MK and a short boat ride away and so we hoped the rain would stop before we got to that point. As we walked unto the resort, a cast member was there giving out stickers, and he gave a couple to Hudson. We were about to keep going when I said, "Hey! I want stickers!" and ducked around Emily to get my own. The cast member, who would normally just rip one off his sticker roll, instead crowned me a Sticker Princess, and wrapped the stickers around me like a sash because he hadn't done it yet that day :) I was very excited. We continued on for Dole Whip! Dole Whip is pineapple flavored soft serve ice cream... and is actually quite delicious. You can only get to at the Poly or at Adventureland in MK, but the one at Poly is a self serve! ;) Our Dole Whips were piled pretty high! ;)
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| My Dole Whip was piled higher than that spoon before I started. |
We finished off our treats and caught the boat to MK. And that's when everything started to go perfectly! As we walked through the gates, the Town Hall showed only a 5 minute wait to meet the boss himself - Mickey Mouse. As we walked inside, it was even less than that! We walked down the line and right in to meet him; no one was ahead of us! Right afterwards, we jumped in line to meet the princesses. While this line was not walk-right-in, it was only about a 15 minute wait. Both Mickey and the Princesses are often over an hour's wait, and so I was so excited to meet Cinderella, Aurora and Rapunzel! :) I still haven't met Belle, but she has her own area now, so the next time I go to MK for opening, you can bet that it where I'll be headed first thing!!
Because of the rain, a lot of the guests had been scared away and gone home, so when we got up to the castle on Main Street, there was hardly anyone around.We took a while to take pictures and we walked through the castle to the other side; just wandering and taking our time :) We decided that none of us had really explored Storybook Circus yet and so we should do the rides there; we looked around the shops and decided that doing the rides would actually be more fun in the dark and that we should get supper first! We walked through new Fanatasyland and ate at Pinocchio Village Haus and I had a delicious barbeque chicken pizza... and chocolate cake!
On the way back to Storybook Circus, we passed by the the new Ariel ride which, again, is usually a very long wait. The sign said only 5 minutes, so we raced down the queue and again, were able to just walk on to the ride :) It is very cute and we all sang along and pointed out the things we hadn't noticed other times we'd been on. As it came to an end, I expressed the thought that we could almost just stay on! The cast member heard me, and in very-unlike-Disney fashion, let us get right back on using the exit ramp! It was one of those great Disney moments :)
As we went to Storybook Circus, more Disney moments were about to be had; we got into the line for Dumbo, there was a really cute college programmer who works there, and again were able to just walk right on! Then we went to the kiddie roller coaster, and AGAIN basically walked right on. It was unexpectedly intense and very short, but still fun.
By the time we were done, it was about 10 minutes until the light show on the castle. We found a perfect spot right up front and center and I tried my best to not take any pictures and just enjoy it! Wishes came right after, and was beautiful as always. Some of the fireworks were hard to see though, because we were actually so close.
At the end of wishes, Emily and Hudson wanted to stay and go on Space Mountain, but I was definitely done for the night. So we split up and I followed the masses down main street, out the gates and caught a bus home.
Another very long day of parks, so I know I will sleep very soundly tonight!
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