Searching for Animals!

On our second day in Disney, we spent the day looking for animals at Animal Kingdom! We somehow persuaded my dad that we needed to get up early and take advantage of the extra magic hours because we were staying on Disney property. If it had not been for the fact that his grandchildren were with us, there is no way he would have done this!! Ellie and I enticed him with riding Everest several times if he got up!

We made it about 30 minutes before the park opened and what a difference it made! We walked on Everest (probably my favorite roller coaster!) twice in a row, then we got a fastpass for the Kali River Rapids, and proceeded to the safari ride! We were done riding all of the rides we wanted and we had eaten a brunch with the characters by 12:30!! At this point I was feeling like a Disney pro!!

The safari ride was amazing on this particular morning! The sky was a beautiful blue with large cotton ball clouds and all the animals were up and about because the heat had not set in yet! We had several animals walk across the road in front of our vehicle. I love the fact that Disney has gone out of their way to make the land as close to their natural habitat as possible.

Who's more excited here? Mommy or the kids - probably mommy, but everyone ate really well and enjoyed our brunch at the Tusker House!!

After our lunch we stumbled upon a little area where there were many characters interacting with the kids! I always think of my brother when I see Thumper because when he was little he lost his favorite stuffed Thumper and my parents went through a lot to get a new one! This was before online shopping!!
Ellie had her hair braided for the first time while we all had a rest in the shade!! I was so happy that she could do something "girly" and fun for her - I love how Disney can appeal to all age groups!! We all got soaked after riding on the "Kali River Rabbits" as Eens called it!! Poor Eens, he begged not to go on it, but I sort of made him, and the whole ride, he and I were going backwards through every waterfall there was!!

My only problem with our day was that Eens and Coop would have rather played carnival games the entire time - all I could think was that I could have saved a few hundred dollars and taken them to the LeRoy Fall Festival! They would be happy out there!! Another problem with this was the cost of a game was $2.50 and we had to keep playing until all three children won a stuffed animal!! ahhhh....