Disney's Animal Kingdom 2016

I am a huge fan of Disney. I always have been and I always will be. This year I had the opportunity to go to Walt Disney World in Florida with my boyfriend and his mum and we had such a great time.

On the first full day we were in Orlando, Axel and I went to Disney's Animal Kingdom. However, the getting there wasn't as simple as we had expected it to be. Before we had even left the hotel car park, a man in another vehicle alerted to the fact that our rental car had a hole in the tyre. Commence a lot of worry and panic trying to find a car tyre place able to fix it.

Luckily, due to the tyre issue, we missed all of the early commuter traffic and had a straight run through to Disney's Animal Kingdom. I was going to vlog the entire day but I got too caught up in the excitement I decided it would be a more enjoyable experience for me to enjoy the day by living through it rather than half enjoying it though a video later.

When we collected our tickets, we both got our first time badges. I have been to Disney before but only to Paris. So, it wasn't a lie.

Then, we told a little fib and pretended it was my birthday so that I could have the full Disney experience. All day people were wishing me a happy birthday.

As we entered the park, we walked straight to an area with people dressed in the same uniform as Russell from the Disney Movie Up. Now, we all know that Up is one of the greatest Disney movies ever. And, I'll let you in on a little secret. Russell is in my list of my top 5 Disney characters (full list coming soon). So, this area was not to be avoided. Once we approached those people they informed us of an ongoing activity throughout the park. The idea was to find Wilderness Explorers at different locations to earn your Wilderness Explorer stickers to add to your book. Being the children that we are, Axel and I decided that this was a once in a lifetime experience and proceeded to recite the Wilderness Explorers code.

THE WILDERNESS MUST BE EXPLORED

CAW CAW

ROOOOOAR!

As you can imagine, the rest of the day was filled with a lot of determination to complete our sticker books. I think I'll make a whole separate blog post about that for those interested. If not, you'll never reach the end of this post. So, just imagine lots of breaks to carry out tasks in order to collect stickers.

After receiving our books, we headed to Africa.

The first place we went to in Africa was the Harambe theatre (RIP Harambe) to see the Festival of the Lion King.

Due to the tyre incident, we had missed our fast pass time and had to join the regular queue. However we were only queuing for less than 5 minutes before we were sat down, and we were even sat down before any of the fast pass people were.

The theatre was split into four different sections: the elephant section, the lion section, the warthog section and the giraffe section. We were in the giraffe section and had to make giraffe noises. I didn't even know what a giraffe sounded like until then but apparently it makes a low bleating sound kind of like a sheep. The show that followed was absolutely spectacular. It was full of all the songs and some amazing dance and gymnastic routines. I made a mental note to definitely book tickets to see The Lion King musical in London as I'm sure it's even more amazing! I didn't record any of the good parts as I was too busy watching it through my own eyes rather than through the camera, but here's a little sneak peak:

After we exited the Harambe theatre, we headed straight to Kilimanjaro Safaris. 

We didn't realise our pre-safari selfie had been photobombed until about a week later.

In all honesty, I have never been on a real safari or even one of those UK safaris that you can drive through in your own car. So, I was more than excited. I absolutely love animals so it is a nice idea to be able to see them being well looked after and in such a big enclosure. It is much better for them than being in a regular zoo. I won't post any spoilers of the Kilimanjaro Safaris attraction but I will say that I loved it so much and the lady who conducted the tour was very funny and made it an enjoyable experience.

Bongos are usually quite timid creatures. However this one decided to stand right in front of our truck.

After our safari, we walked along a trail where there were lots of birds in an open enclosure so we could get really close to them. Also along the trail there were naked mole rats! To many people this may not sound exciting but they were so much smaller than I thought they would be. I thought they would be about 15cm long. I was very mistaken.

For lunch we went to Pizzafari. We went there because we were so hot we literally needed to sit in air conditioning. The service was terrible so if we had to redo it, we would have just gotten food from one of the little stalls outside as the stalls are much cheaper. I don't like to give negative reviews but I will never go to Pizzafari again.

After lunch, we walked all the way to Asia. I say all the way because it sounds cool to walk from one continent to the other but in reality it only took about five minutes.

The first thing we did in Asia was buy ice cream. I'm not an ice cream person. I usually dislike ice cream. But, this wasn't any ice cream. It was a Disney ice cream. What makes it so Disney you ask? Nothing, just the fact that I had bought it in Disney's Animal Kingdom. However, I'm not joking when I say that this is one of the best ice creams I have ever had. And, considering the temperature was making me sweat from orifices I didn't even know my body had, it was well needed. Although Axel and I could probably have bought one to share because neither of us could finish our own.

Once ice cream consumption was complete, it was time for my fastpass on Expedition Everest. Axel and I estimated it would take me about twenty to thirty minutes to get through the queue and do the ride so he went away to do his own thing and meet me afterwards. He absolutely hates rides.

 I got in the queue and realised that the idea of a fastpass on this particular attraction was useless as the fastpass line and the regular line merged together after all of about 5 metres. The single riders line however had no queue at all. People were just walking through and getting straight onto the ride, so I decided to do that instead. I won't post any spoilers for the ride as I know there are a lot of theme park fanatics in this world who would hate me if I did. But, I can honestly say that out of the three Disney parks I visited, Expedition Everest was by far my favourite ride. And, due to Axel and I waaaaay overestimating how long I would spend queueing (yay single riders) I managed to go on the ride three times before he came back to meet me. This was probably not a good idea for me considering I'd just eaten an ice cream. Luckily, I didn't actually throw up.

Once meeting up with Axel again and discovering that his HUF hat had been ruined by the backpack that ruins every item of clothing, we headed to the Kali River Rapids. This was the longest queue we had been in all day, about thirty to forty minutes. The estimated wait had been one hour so our wait wasn't so bad. However, this was the most disappointing water ride I've ever known to exist. Warning: spoilers. You go up on the ride as you do with all rides, and there is a drop that soaks two to three of the people on the raft depending on the angle of the raft when it hits the water and the rest of the raft's occupants are only given a little sprinkle. At this point everyone is happy. Until we turn the corner and realise that was the only drop of the entire ride and now we have to get off. I was expecting a minimum of about three drops. NOT ONE?! 1/5 stars. Would not recommend.

We made up for our sadness by Axel trying on a traditional Asian hat.

From here, Axel and I decided to go to Rafiki's Planet Watch because by now it was about 4:30pm and Rafiki's Planet Watch was to close at 6:00pm. Rafiki's Planet Watch is an area of the park just off of Africa that you need to access via train. Whilst waiting for the train, I decided I would use the penny press. If you don't know what a penny press is, you insert a penny and usually a quarter and press a button. The machine then squishes the penny and imprints the design you have chosen on to it. I chose a Pumba design as I wanted a memory of the Festival of the Lion King Show. But, as I was doing it, a little boy kept trying to choose a design for me (I think he was thinking I was getting it for him). I felt super awkward as his parents were just watching him do this and not telling him that it wasn't appropriate. Anyway, once I had chosen, the penny dropped out and I picked it up and the boy held out his hand expecting me to give it to him. Again, his parents didn't say anything. Very weird.

We then got on the train to Rafiki's Planet Watch which was essentially an area of the park for those completing the Wilderness Explorers sticker book. There was lots about conservation. And, they also had a little area where you can brush and stroke goats and alpacas!

We did also visit Dinoland USA but this area of the park is typically for young children. So, I don't have anything to say or any photos to show you of this area of the park.

We ended our day in the gift shop (Alex's favourite place of any attraction) where we each bought a lanyard and some pins. All day we had been seeing people wearing the classic Disney lanyards and trading all their pins and quite frankly we were very jealous. So, we bought our own! If you would like to see my lanyard and pins then watch the following video:

And then we went to Starbucks (I've drunk more Starbucks this holiday than in my entire life) for Berry Refreshers. They even had special Disney Parks cups!

We ended up getting a taxi back to our hotel which cost around $75. I wouldn't recommend doing that.