Animal Kingdom

On Wednesday morning, the kids were given the choice to visit another park or go out to breakfast & have a little pool time. No surprise, they choose the pool. The Yacht Club has a spectacular pool. If it had been just a tad bit warmer, I think we would have spent even more time poolside. Because the pool didn't open until 10, we made reservations at Kouzzina on the Boardwalk for breakfast. Though I don't watch the Iron Chef, I was curious about Cat Cora's restaurant. We loved the breakfast & I would definitely love to try it for dinner.

Just before lunch, we decided to head to the Animal Kingdom. Usually, the park clears out in the early afternoon. This rule apparently doesn't apply during Thanksgiving week. It was crazy crowded. While Nick went to find fast passes, I tried to decided what to do first. We tried Camp Minnie Mickey for autographs, but it was too crowded. So, we decided to do the next showing of the Lion King.

Ella & I saw the Broadway production a few years ago & I was hoping this would be a similar show for the twins.

I enjoyed the performance, but it was quite a bit different (both in costumes and content) than the play or movie.

I was very impressed with all the Disney performances we saw. Truly amazing performers.

After the show, we had an amazing lunch at the Flametree BBQ and then someone was VERY happy when another guest told us that there was no line to meet Tigger & Co.

Animal Kingdom does not have a lot of rides. The triceratops ride is the only one the twins could ride. Greta declared it L-A-M-E.

Nick didn't heed my advice to skip Dinosaur. The reviews I had read were 1. It's not that fun and 2. It's super scary. But, a lot of people wanted to ride it, so Nick wanted to check it out. He declared the ride L-A-M-E and said that Ella had her eyes shut & ears covered the whole ride.

One of the favorite parts of AK for the kids was the Boneyard. They would have happily spent hours here. It's basically a really, really big playground. The kids would only leave when we promised to take them back the next day.

At about 4 pm, I took the twins to the Safari while Nick & Ella went to try Expedition Everest  (the mega roller coaster). We walked onto the Safari (it's a hot ticket at the park).

I really enjoyed the safari and I think the twins did too.

It's far too short.

And, very bumpy (& dark this time of year). Lots of my photos looked like this!

After the safari, we met up & saw A Bug's Life (again, enjoyed by all).

Followed by the Finding Nemo musical (one of the kids favorite shows of the week). The musical does a great job of hitting the highlights of the movie in 30 minutes.

Miss Greta was super tired at this point so we decided to use our Expedition Everest fast passes. The twins patiently played with glow sticks and loved that Nick & Ella wore them so that they could see when they flew past us.

Since we had a late lunch, we took the bus back to the hotel for dinner. We had some quick service credits to use. The closest place to use them at our hotel was at the poolside restaurant. Greta apparently thought this was very glamorous and told her class all about it.

It was early to bed this evening as we prepared for our last day in the Magic Kingdom.

Hoop De Doo Revue

Obviously my live blogging from Disney fell a little flat. I was so excited yesterday to start blogging about our trip when Nick mentioned that it looked like Hogan was having some trouble breathing. Within 30 minutes, he was gone. While we knew we were on borrowed time, we didn't expect him to die yesterday. He had such a great couple of days after we returned home. Sunday, he pranced around the park. Monday, he jumped up & into the car every time I left the house. Needless to say, it was an emotionally draining day. We'll give Hogan a proper post soon. Right now, I need to return to the Happiest Place on Earth.

We left Epcot on the monorail & then caught a boat to Fort Wilderness. It's good that we left early as there was a 30 minute delay on the boat. While the sunset was lovely, the kids would have preferred a little more time on the playground at Ft. Wilderness.

My friend Christy said her kids loved this dinner show. Since we are on the dining plan, we used 2 dinner meal tickets for each person. On our first night, we didn't eat a sit down dinner so it wasn't an issue to use two tickets on this night.  If we had paid out of pocket, it would have cost $220 for the family.  Not an inexpensive night. But, if you can eat cheaply on other nights to compensate, it would be worth the money.
Looking at Charlie's unhappy face, I was worried this was going to be a long night & poor investment.

I shouldn't have worried. Once the show started, Ella & Charlie's faces lit up. They love any type of visual entertainment (movies, plays, musical performances). The show is broken up into little skits between courses. After the intro, Greta clapped & asked {hopefully} if it was time to go. Performances don't capture her attention in quite the same way.

The show was great. The food was enjoyable & much better than I expected. Salad, cornbread, ribs, fried chicken, potatoes, beans and strawberry shortcakes served family style.

We were impressed with all of the Disney performances that we saw. Even Miss Greta started humming the tunes after the show.

The kids talked about the play the rest of the trip. Definitely a fun night. The only downside was that our seats weren't great. They are distributed as people pick them up. Since we arrived the day before the performance, we were among the last families to get our table assignment. We still enjoyed the show, it just would have been better to be closer to the action.

We made it back to the hotel fairly quickly (boat to Magic Kingdom & then bus to our hotel). We were thrilled to discover that we could see the Epcot fireworks from our hotel balcony. It was a great end to our second day!

Happiest Room On Earth

Grandma & Grandpa came to town this weekend. They delivered some very good news. We are spending Thanksgiving in Disney World this year. Nick & I have been busy planning this for a few months & we were so excited for the grandparents to share the news. Nick put the Disney vaction planning DVD in, Grandma gave the kids Disney T-shirts and autograph books and then explained what was going on.

I said we would probably have to eat turkey for Christmas since we won't be eating it for Thanksgiving this year. Ella said that was fine because this trip will be way better than turkey.

We went to Disney for Thanksgiving once when I was growing up. I remember the park being empty. We rode Space Mountain several times in a row. It's not like that anymore. Thanksgiving is now one of the busiest times to visit Disney World. Thank goodness there are so many businesses ready to help you plan a route that goes against the crowds. It's a bit overwhelming to plan a multi-day Disney trip. Over the next six weeks, I will post some of the tips that I have learned so far.