Day Three - Part Two - More Fastpasses and Tusker House!
After our safari was over, we were already in the window for our second Fastpass, which of course was on the other side of the park... So, off we went to Dinoland! We entered the fastpass line for Dinosaur, and only waited about 10 minutes before we were time traveling back in time. This ride reminded me a lot of the Indiana Jones ride in
Disneyland, it uses the same technology for the ride vehicles. But, there really is no comparing the two - Indy wins hands down. I kind of feel like Disney cheaped out when making Dinosaur, just making a lot of it dark. With Indiana Jones, there is so much detail put into the entire ride, and everytime I go on it I notice more. Don't get me wrong, Dinosaur was still fun though!
Here's our ride photo (we're in the bottom left hand corner, I'm holding on to my headband):
After re-entering 2016, we still had time before our next Fastpass. We saw that Primeval Whirl only had a 20 minute standby time, so we jumped into line for that. The posted wait time was pretty much exact, and 20 minutes later we were getting onto the ride where I snapped these pictures:
The ride itself was a crazy-mouse style roller coaster, but the cars actually spin a bit. I'm not a huge fan of this type of ride, but this was one of the better ones I've ever been on. By the time we exited the ride, it was within our window for our third (and final) Fastpass of the day. But first, let me backtrack a bit.
As we were walking over to DinoLand, I wasn't feeling 100% and stopped to use the bathroom before we went on the ride. Before getting in line for Primeval Whirl, I went to the bathroom again. I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease in February 2013, so I've had this for a few years now. It sucks, but I'm determined to not let this disease dictate my life. A lot of people are affected way worse than I am - I travel a few times per year, I go to sports events, concerts, festivals, etc and I've continued working full time (when I was first diagnosed, I was so sick I ended up being hospitalized for 10 days, and my doctor would not clear me to return to work for over 3 months, but the company I was working for promised me my job would be waiting for me when I was feeling up to coming back - it was, and I just hit my 5 year milestone with them - just a little tangent because I'm so grateful!).
Anyways, we were off to Expedition Everest! I absolutely loved this ride! I wasn't feeling great, but I was still able to really enjoy our search for the Yedi. I also love our ride picture from this:
Yes, Luke was playing the air drums.
When we got off, we decided to head back to Africa. We were still about 45 minutes away from our reservation time at Tusker House, but I wasn't feeling good and was not up to going on another ride at that moment. We tried to find the Fastpass Kiosk that was shown on the map we had grabbed as we entered the park, but we kept walking past where it should have been and could not find it. I was feeling worse and worse, and knew I needed to get food and water into my body ASAP. We were still half an hour away from our lunch reservation time, but we went to check in at Tusker House anyways and ask if we could get in early. Luckily it was not a problem, and 5 minutes later we were led to our table. I ordered a glass of water because I was feeling extremely dehydrated and went straight to the buffet to start grabbing food. Sometimes when I'm feeling like this, I'm able to revive myself by eating and getting rehydrated.
Since I wasn't feeling good, and my main focus was on getting food into my body, I did not take a picture of mine or Luke's first plates of food. I do know I didn't fill my first plate, I think I focused mainly on the salad section and just started eating. We did not have to wait long before the first character approached our table - I had already drank an entire glass of water by this point so I was feeling slightly better (at least enough to stand up and take a picture).
I ended up going back to the buffet two more times for food, and I actually remembered to take a picture of one of them:
When I went up for dessert, I couldn't decide on what I wanted, so I think I grabbed one of everything, and then split the plate with Luke.
There were 4 characters in total who visited our table during our meal, all of whom were dressed in Safari outfits - Mickey, Donald, Daisy and Goofy. Since the restaurant was not even close to being full, we ended up seeing a couple of the characters 2 or 3 times.
I just realized I did not get a picture with Goofy. Oh well. At one point during the meal, Goofy actually came into the room where we were and tried to gather all of the kids to join him in a little parade, clapping their hands and dancing around the room. There were only like 3 kids who actually went up, and Luke felt bad, so he went and joined them. He followed Goofy around the room twice clapping his hands and laughing, while I taped the entire thing. Have I mentioned I love him? Haha.
The food was amazing here, Luke is still talking about it and wants to make sure we have an ADR for Tusker House on our next trip to WDW (which might be sooner than expected, but I'll get to that in another post...). I managed to eat a lot of food, but I still was not feeling well at all. I actually had to make 3 trips to the bathroom during our meal
After scanning our magic bands for a table service credit each, and paying the tip out of pocket we left. If we were paying out of pocket, it would have cost $41.99/each or $89.44 for both of us after tax.
I still was not feeling good, and had to make yet another bathroom break shortly after we left the restaurant. We decided to get in line to go see Festival of the Lion King, but before the doors even opened I decided I couldn't do it, and I was full-out sick. After yet another trip the bathroom, I sadly had to call and cancel our supper reservation for the night - at 1900 Park Fare
I was so excited about going to see the Grand Floridian, and now there was no way we could make it work into our schedule - I was really sad, but I know my body well enough to know it was not an option for tonight. At that point, we decided to call it a day and just go back to our hotel room - it was only about 2:30.
On our way out, we stopped to take a few pictures of these guys:
I also stopped to snap a few pics of the tree just outside the park before we boarded our bus.
Up next: Nap time and Intermission Food Court