Day 3 of our awesome Disney World vacation begins in Animal Kingdom.
When you first walk into Animal Kingdom you look up and see the "Tree of Life". It is huge and thus impressive. But look closer and you will see that carved into the tree are animals, all different types and the detail of it all is amazing.
I would love to say that when presented with this view we all paused to take it in and even take a family picture (I mean, hello? Do you know me at all?). But our family was too busy hauling across the park so we could beat the line for a safari ride into the wild. Tree of Life? Forget it! With AJ in the stroller, I was speed walking so fast that mall walkers wouldn't know what to do about the breeze of my wake as I rushed by them. Daddy and KK were walking as fast as they could too and we might have been racing one another and laughing at ourselves... and I will admit it: In order to pass a large family of like ten people, I ran the last 10 yards to squeeze in front of them and claim our spot in line. Sure I might have been out of breath (the darn safari was on the complete other side of the park for some dumb reason) and sweating and the park had only been open for five minutes, but did I mention the part about sweetly passing that large family to claim our victorious spot in line? I mean sure, it doesn't seem as impressive if you realize that said safari has trucks that hold like 30 people and they take off every 3 minutes. But who knew that? So just skip that part and let's focus on the next picture...
The wild!
KK and Daddy taking in the sights
Our favorite part: the grasslands with giraffes walking around everywhere
Of course it was worth the race over to see the animals. It was neat how the trucks drove through shallow creeks and over rocks and mud, just like I imagine a real safari feels like. And the animals we saw were some of our favorites. The lions were napping on these huge rocks, the elephants were stomping around with huge tusks... even the zebras were chilling in the shade when we drove by, hanging out by the rhinos. But having the amazing zoo we have near our home, the kids weren't overly impressed like other kiddos on the tour. They have grown up seeing the lions and rhinos and monkeys right down the road from our house. So while it was totally neat to check this off our list of things to see at Animal Kingdom, we were ready for the next adventure pretty quickly.
These two little monkeys were having more fun climbing the rocks and goofing off then taking in the sights around them. Typical :-)
So today we planned a character breakfast with Donald Duck and friends... but before our reservation time, we decided to head to our #1 destination at Animal Kingdom: Expedition Everest. Supposedly the fastest and best rollercoaster ride at Disneyworld!
Here is KK pointing to the rollercoaster. Yup, it is a rollercoaster up on and inside a mountain. Mount Everest to be exact, not a tiny little ride by any means. And KK was ready to conquer the mountain!!! Her FIRST official rollercoaster ride... bring it!
Let me just say that it was AMAZING! I got to ride with her first and while we were both a little nervous after we buckled up, the moment the ride started KK had her arms in the air and started screaming for fun. My screams might have been more of the fear variety... it had been a few years since my last rollercoaster ride. And that whole making the ride stop and suddenly go backwards in the dark before a Yeti jumps out at you.... Not cool Disney, not cool. Just teasing, it was so much fun.
And KK LOVED IT! So much that the moment we jumped off to find Daddy, she grabbed his hand to go again with him. I wanted to ride it again too, but we had to head back across the park to have breakfast with a very special duck that a very special boy desperately wanted to see again.
So before we proceed, let's play a game. Can you find AJ in this picture? No? Need a hint? Look between my legs.. yup! Shockingly, AJ refused to take a picture at Tusker House before we went into breakfast. The funnier part of this story? They actually printed this exact picture that the restaurant took and asked me if I wanted to buy it for only $34. I told them if they could find my son in the picture I would consider it. Needless to say they looked a little confused as I giggled.
There he is! He was all smiles after hitting the buffet (and finding donuts there along with Mickey shaped waffles) and ready to meet Donald Duck and the gang.
They didn't disappoint, within moments Donald Duck came over. He was dressed for a safari and so excited to see the kids.
AJ was hugging him so tight and smiling so big! I decided, much to Daddy's embarrassment, to engage the characters today and act silly. So I asked Donald: "Why don't they have Donald Duck shaped waffles around here?". I think Donald was waiting for someone to ask that question for years, he immediately high fived me and signaled "I know, right?". That got the kids laughing.
Next to our table was Mickey!
The kids were pretty excited as this was the FIRST TIME to meet Mickey in person!
And they weren't the only ones excited! GROUP SHOT PLEASE!
After Mickey, we got to see Donald's sweetie: Miss Daisy in all her safari glory.
And of course, it isn't a party without Goofy! He had to pose and make sure his ears looked good in the picture :-) I, of course, couldn't contain myself and made a point to say "Oh Gorsh" like Goofy usually does in cartoons when hugging him. He grabbed his stomach and started laughing with me. (This might have been the point where my husband started wishing he was sitting at another table haha).
I would highly recommend Tusker House with Donald Duck! The kids loved meeting all their favorites and the adults loved getting to sit down for a meal and taking a break from all the walking around. The kids even danced around the room with Goofy while playing instruments. The food was good, the hubby even sampled some authentic African foods. Me, on the other hand, I sampled the dessert bar. I highly recommend the bread pudding with warm vanilla sauce! Yum!
After we finished our meal, we decided to walk around the park and see what other characters we might find and see the sights.
Here is a view of Mount Everest and the rollercoaster from across the park (man it was huge).
Disney sure knows how to make things feel authentic - it has to be the details. Check out this carved sign that lets you know you are entering the African section of the park.
It started raining once we left breakfast. The park didn't have as many rides as other parks, so we found ourselves searching for some hard to find characters. Our breakfast left the kids with a need to get even more signatures in their autograph books. AJ started begging to find Pluto, now that he had seen Donald (twice). As we began the Pluto search, we happened upon Tigger and Winnie the Pooh's character spot. More autographs, yea!!!
And yeah, I made us take a family shot with Tigger too!
While AJ was smiling in these pictures, the boy was on a Pluto mission at this point and immediately wanted us moving onward to find him. Despite the rain that was picking up, we put on our very cool ponchos and made our way to DinoLand. Sure enough, we found Pluto with a few other friends. The line wasn't short, so I took a place in line while the others went off to ride a few rides nearby.
Now I am a chatty kind of girl (if you know me at all, this is no surprise)... so of course when you are waiting 40 minutes in line you start to chat with those around you to pass the time. In front of me was a British family on "holiday" and before I knew it we were talking about Prince William and the ever so beautiful Princess Kate. We talked about how they liked America and they admitted they loved hearing our accents. This came after I may have mentioned that my daughter loves pretending to speak "British" thanks to the Winter Olympics and our Aunt JuJu. It was about that point in the chitchat that KK comes up to join me in line. I made the mistake in introducing her and telling KK that they were from England.... without hesitating, KK smiles and proceeds says "Why 'Ello". Yup! I kind of wanted to die, all while laughing out loud. Darn Americans are so weird!
So after 40 minutes of waiting in the pouring rain with barely any cover, we are next in line. AJ is so excited, he is just staring at Pluto and jumping up and down. So imagine how upset he was when one of the character assistants comes over to announce that it's getting too wet and everyone has to head inside until the rain lets up. Poor AJ, he burst into tears. And I do not mean quiet little tears. No he was bawling his sweet eyes out and crying to me "but I wanted to hug Pluto". He was pitiful and we couldn't really blame him for being upset, it stunk. Apparently, everyone from the photographer to the assistants to the characters felt so bad for him that they all agreed rather quickly to let us get our pictures and autographs before they called it a day. Thank you Lord!
KK ran over to Pluto first to give him a hug before saying hi to Goofy and Donald again.
But AJ just had eyes for one big sweet dog... He walked over slowly, just staring as if he couldn't believe it was happening. (so stinkin' sweet)
And then he just ran into Pluto's arms for a big hug. Bless Pluto, he totally hugged onto AJ tight and didn't rush the moment at all. My heart was bursting at this point (and I might have gotten a wee bit teary).
This was the picture that made the whole day worth it :-)
Of course we also took a group shot so Donald and Goofy wouldn't feel too left out. So cute!
So after we hugged them all one more time, we took off for our next ride: the Kali River Rapids. Since it was raining, we decided a wet water ride really wasn't going to affect us much.
Here we are in our ponchos looking so fine.
Note that while ponchos do keep the water off of you and are easy to pack in a backpack, they do nothing for your appearance. You feel as though you are wearing a trash bag around the park. I had forgotten this feeling until now.
Now AJ, having had his breakfast and meeting his Pluto, was done. He didn't want to go on a ride. He didn't want to walk another step. He was DONE. He wanted to go home (aka to the hotel) to get out of this rain. I didn't blame him on the rain part, but we also knew he was exhausted from the late nights and early mornings we had every day. Luckily, the Disney staffers know just what to say to cheer up a five year old boy. When we loaded into our raft, AJ was deemed the "Captain" of the raft. The other family we were riding with - bless them - quickly caught on and we all started begging him to turn the raft so we wouldn't get soaking wet. AJ started grinning, but we all started laughing when we hit the first big wave and Daddy got soaked with a direct hit. AJ loved that he did that to everyone... and the day was saved.
Us after Captain AJ steered us safely out of the rapids!
The captain himself, all smiles and all wet.
I will say that at this point in the day we were so proud of KK (well more than we would be any other day if I am saying that correctly). She was walking and tired and wet too, and somewhat letting AJ lead the way on what was next since she had her rollercoaster ride already. But she didn't complain once, she was our trooper of the day and just enjoying each moment as it happened. Love her so much!
We decided to grab some food from the places we had found in our planning of our trip before departing the park. The first and my absolute favorite snack of maybe the entire trip was at the Yak & Yeti: chicken fried rice and an eggroll. Wow is all I can say!
KK decided she wanted a Mickey shaped pretzel for her snack. We had to search a little bit, but she found it at last!
AJ just wanted to get out of there. We decided that while there were a few other places we could have explored, we had done the big things we really wanted to do. And the temptation of a few extra hours on a dark, rainy day meant only one thing: A NAP!
A quick bath before naptime led to surprise #5 (maybe) - new Disney PJs to wear! The kids pulled those on and were asleep before their heads even hit the pillows.
A few hours later, we were rested and ready for a family dinner. We were headed to 'Ohanas at the Polynesian Resort.
AJ, feeling much more himself after that nap, even wore his "handsome clothes" as he calls them. Of course, Pluto had to join us.
The kids looked so good in their "handsome" clothes. KK was all about wearing a pretty dress for dinner, she wanted to be fancy.
All dressed up for dinner together - so exciting!
So 'Ohana's isn't just a typical restaurant. All the meats are cooked over open flames in the middle of the room and then passed around to the tables. You can eat as much as you like and try anything you like.
Can I just go ahead and say it was delicious!
AJ and Pluto were having fun
and so was KK and Daddy!
Aside from grilled chicken, pork, steak and shrimp that was passed around by wait staff, we also have never ending plates of eggrolls, chicken wings, noodles and veggies.
Here is how they passed around the grilled meats - haha, his face and KK's face. Too funny!
Before dessert, they called over all the children to come over and learn a real Polynesian hula dance. Hmmmm... who do we know that loves to dance?
She was quite the dancer, learning the moves and taking it very seriously! The dance had a story to it, about a feast and the ocean if I recall. I have the entire performance on video but cannot seem to upload it. KK is a natural.. it was so cute to see her concentrating so hard to learn the dance while other little girls around her were goofing off. Not our girl, she is a perfectionist in many ways, even on vacation :-)
When we returned to the table, there was a huge piece of cinnamon rum raisin bread pudding with caramel sauce... oh yes, this is how you end a day! The kids celebrated with ice cream and Mickey Mouse sprinkles :-)
All in all another great day with lots of fun memories! Of course, we didn't know that pole dancing on the monorail would be the highlight of their evening... that was a surprise to say the least. But hey, it's vacation so we went with it.
Sweet dreams Y'all, from the happiest place on Earth!
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