“All Aboard the Seven Dwarfs Whine Train!” A May 2015/Mother's Day TR! ***TR COMPLETED 2/8!!!

[princessesandpascal]

(continued from last post!)

These guys crossed our path at the end!

After the safari, we walked over to the FOTLK theatre, as there were about 20 minutes until the next show started.

This was another new thing for us: we’d just never gotten the timing right to see the show before. We waited in the front waiting area for a little while, and then were ushered in to our seats. We were pretty high up, but had a really great view!

(You can probably guess from this picture that we were seated in the elephant section!)

We loved the show. My favourite part was the acrobatic bird dancers, and Mom loved the opening Circle of Life number where they brought out the floats for the first time.

After the show, we slowly made our way out of the theatre in the human hordes, stopping to admire the floats on the way. When we were outside the theatre, we agreed unanimously that it was time to break for lunch. There was one destination I had in mind for where to eat, and after a few minutes of walking, we arrived!

Up Next: Chapter 10! “But where are the otters?” We Explore the Tree of Life, Meet New Friends, and Head Back in Time Once Again!​

 

[nilla]

LOVE LOVE LOVE Dinosaur! So upset we missed it last year. It's so intense, and the dino attacks are very realistic! Great ride photos, btw

Perhaps your EE experience would have gone better had you sacrificed a pony tail band to the Yeti? I hear that helps.

We, too, have had to argue the side of "no, you do NOT go upside down on Expedition Everest." It becomes a bit frustrating - especially when it's with people who are by no stretch "Disney junkies" like we are. TRUST US!

Dylan gets a kick out of the Safari music every year. "This is my jam."

Animal Kingdom is such a fun park, and it's even better when the crowds are small.

FOTL is a great show! Gymnast monkeys...what else can you ask for?

We've never been to Pizzafari, so I can't wait to hear the write-up on it!

Great updates, as always.

 

[KathyM2]

unfortunately were followed in by a very rowdy group of elementary school kids on a field trip,

Can you imagine going to WDW as a field trip in school?? I just can't lol. But I'm sorry they were annoying.

I will never understand my body’s intolerance for thrill rides.

Sorry you didn't enjoy the ride...but at least you went. I can't go on that at all...in fact...I'm a little worried even Dinosaur and Star Tours may make me nauseous lol.

Royal Anandapur Tea Company on the way for a frozen chai (

That sounds really good!! But...without a straw...a bit of a pain!

 

[Cando86]

I just found your TR and am loving it!

Dinosaur is also one of my favs! When I was younger and couldn't tell the difference between fantasy and reality, not so much

FOTLK - ahh, one of my absolutely favorite things in all of Disney! It's so great.

Looking forward to more!

 

[princessesandpascal]

LOVE LOVE LOVE Dinosaur! So upset we missed it last year. It's so intense, and the dino attacks are very realistic! Great ride photos, btw

Perhaps your EE experience would have gone better had you sacrificed a pony tail band to the Yeti? I hear that helps.

We, too, have had to argue the side of "no, you do NOT go upside down on Expedition Everest." It becomes a bit frustrating - especially when it's with people who are by no stretch "Disney junkies" like we are. TRUST US!

Dylan gets a kick out of the Safari music every year. "This is my jam."

Animal Kingdom is such a fun park, and it's even better when the crowds are small.

FOTL is a great show! Gymnast monkeys...what else can you ask for?

We've never been to Pizzafari, so I can't wait to hear the write-up on it!

Great updates, as always.

I can't believe we hadn't done Dinosaur before this year! It's a must-do for me now. I would seriously go to AK and spend a whole day doing nothing but Dinosaur with maybe one show of FOTLK and one Safari. I think by the end of the day we'd done it four times. So fun!

Ahh, maybe next time!

The gymnast monkeys were spectacular! Such a great show. So much going on you'd probably never focus on the same things twice.

Thank you!

Can you imagine going to WDW as a field trip in school?? I just can't lol. But I'm sorry they were annoying.

Sorry you didn't enjoy the ride...but at least you went. I can't go on that at all...in fact...I'm a little worried even Dinosaur and Star Tours may make me nauseous lol.

That sounds really good!! But...without a straw...a bit of a pain!

I was saying the same thing to Mom that day! Just getting to go to Disney for a day? So fun! We saw a group at DHS another day and of course countless grad trips from what looked like grade 8s. The kids weren't too bad, just the queue for EE echoed their shouts a little more than usual!

I actually get headaches on Star Tours to the point that I can't ride it anymore and didn't attempt it this year. I tried it three years before giving up. Not exactly sure why, but even though ST and EE give me issues, Dinosaur was fine. It's pretty rough, but doesn't really do very many drops (there's only one or two tiny ones!) and doesn't spin or anything. Just bucks you around a little!

It was equivalent to trying to drink a Starbucks frappuccino with no straw. Wasn't easy!

I just found your TR and am loving it!

Dinosaur is also one of my favs! When I was younger and couldn't tell the difference between fantasy and reality, not so much

FOTLK - ahh, one of my absolutely favorite things in all of Disney! It's so great.

Looking forward to more!

Thanks for following along!

I actually befriended a little girl later in the week whose mom was nervous to take her on Dinosaur because of that very reason!

FOTLK was beautiful, definitely a must-do!

 

[Gracefulskinny]

while Mom thought she was helping by letting me make all the choices, I was becoming way too stressed

Strange how that can happen right?

And we got stopped inside Space Mountain for a good 5-10 minutes. As is standard for us on the TTA, if we get stopped, it is ALWAYS inside Space.

There are worse places to be stopped on that ride. For instance, before you enter space mountain there is a magic spot where I have been stopped a few times that hovers right over the Speedway AND a Designated Smoking area!

And the camera didn't work for our photo, so all you have is this one of my score:

Love!

At least we all had a good sense of humour about it, and the entire boat was laughing through our screeches.

I could not get that car’s steering together whatsoever.

Its the track that's the problem. Its too messed up to steer correctly.

(This is what happens when Mom edits the Photopass pictures.)

I tried to keep her distracted from her song (which she had clearly been going on about for quite some time, judging by her parents’ expressions) by talking about princesses and exchanging stories.

How very sweet of you. I'm sure her parents enjoyed the break!

When we arrived at Everest, we got in the standby line and unfortunately were followed in by a very rowdy group of elementary school kids on a field trip, most of whom were seated behind us in the train.

And Mom was convinced it went upside down, even when I googled it to confirm that it didn’t.

Its the wrong harness for an upside down coaster.

Still frustrates me that Everest threw me for a loop, but PW spins pretty much the whole ride and I was fine. I will never understand my body’s intolerance for thrill rides.

FOr me my motion sickness gets a lot worse when I can't see the track and anticipate where we will be going next.

Clearly, I handled the presence of the Carnotaurus super well.

 

[princessesandpascal]

There are worse places to be stopped on that ride. For instance, before you enter space mountain there is a magic spot where I have been stopped a few times that hovers right over the Speedway AND a Designated Smoking area!

That is NOT somewhere I ever want to get stuck!

Its the track that's the problem. Its too messed up to steer correctly.

I didn't have too hard of a time with the track, it was the steering wheel itself for me! I kept turning it too far I guess so it sprung back and overcorrected to try and keep me on the right path. Still hilarious!

 

[nilla]

I think the Pascal magic shot would've been better had you been holding a plastic fork in the other hand.

 

[princessesandpascal]

Chapter 10: “But where are the otters?” We Explore the Tree of Life, Meet New Friends, and Head Back in Time Once Again!

When we last left off, we were just entering this haven:

Pizzafari! This restaurant is essentially a deal made between Mom and I. She hates Pizza Planet in DHS, so we agree that I will skip Pizza Planet as long as we can go to Pizzafari so I can get my taste of Disney pizza at some point on the trip. Pop has its new pizza slices, but it's just not the same. We headed inside and placed our orders, and then found seats in the emptiest room in the whole restaurant (which we shared with a few more of those elementary kids).
I got the pepperoni pizza and a Sprite (with a straw!), while Mom got a veggie pizza with a water, and a Caesar salad on the side. The pizza here is classic Disney pizza: not the best pizza in the world but it is just so soft and delicious while in the Disney bubble. Mom swears that it’s better at Pizzafari than Pizza Planet, but I’m 90% sure it’s the exact same at both places.

This photo is just to show the demonic-looking lion that was on the wall behind me for the entirety of our meal. The entire room was covered in murals of demonic-looking animals. So fun!

Pizzas consumed and bodies rested, we decided to head out to the Discovery Island trails to walk around, see the carvings, and see some of the animals! I think we stopped to pin trade as well because I am not wearing my lanyard in the Pizzafari photo, but I am a bit later. We’d never taken a lot of time by the Tree and we wanted to really settle in and enjoy all that AK had to offer. We set out down one of the paths and started our exploration.

As we continued down the path, we came across a line (what else is new, we were still in Disney!), which we realized was to meet Pocahontas. The line was still open, and ended up next to one of the animal enclosures, so we got in line to meet one of my favourite childhood Disney characters. Luckily, the line took us past the porcupines, who we watched for a bit.

There were two CMs in the enclosure with the two porcupines, feeding them, giving them treats, and guiding them to hop over rocks kind of like agility training. The porcupines were really cute!

On the other side of the path were some kind of parrot. A macaw, maybe? Are macaws blue too?

Finally, we were at the front of the line for Pocahontas. She was running out of time, so we stopped just for a picture and a quick discussion about whether Rapunzel’s braid on my mouse ears would give me healing powers.

We continued to explore after meeting Pocahontas, and we quickly met a tortoise in his enclosure!

The path spit us back into the main area of Discovery Island, so we checked the MDE app to figure out exactly where we were. We walked around a bit on the main path and found some more parrots (I know these ones are macaws for SURE.)

And somewhere along the way, we found this adorable lemur and spent a while searching for the ringtail lemur that was in the enclosure with him. We finally spotted him inside a log, but we couldn’t get the right angle for a picture. So we just have a photo of this super cute guy.

​

We picked another trail and headed down it. We were disappointed to hear from one of the Wilderness Explorer CMs that the red kangaroos (one of the animals I really wanted to see) were relocated and unavailable because of the intense construction being done near the Tree, and that the otters were notoriously evasive. We looked and looked n their enclosure, but saw no otters (we were disappointed because they’re my best friend’s favourite animal and I was hoping to send her some pictures!)​

Even though we found no otters or kangaroos, we did find lots of cool carvings!


(continued in next post)​

 

[princessesandpascal]

(continued from last post!)

And best of all, just as we were about to head back to Dinosaur for our 1:40 FP+, I finally spotted my own favourite animal on the Tree!

A KOALA! I’m still disappointed that AK has no Australia section. Wombats, kangaroos, wallabies, koalas… it would be my dream come true, honestly.

That said, it was time to head back to Dinosaur for our 1:40 FP+! We tapped our bands and headed in:

Only to realize that we really didn’t need them. The standby line was posted 10 minutes, but it was a walk-on, and we were stuck behind a group that didn’t know how to tap their magicbands. We watched two or three parties walk right in before the other group finally got it together and we got to enter. In the future, I don’t even think I’d make any FPs for AK and make them for a park we’d visit in the evening. I’d do the Safari at park opening and then just wait standby for Dinosaur. The queue is air-conditioned anyways, so even if it were busy, it wouldn’t be so bad.
We headed down into our Time Rover and once again got seated in the very front!

This is my “if I don’t look at the Carnotaurus, it will not be there” position.

After we finished, the standby line was still a walk-on so we decided to go again!

This time, we got seats in the middle row, next to a nice older couple. Mom took the outside, then me, then the wife, then the husband. They clearly had never been on the ride before, which I could tell when the Carnotaurus first popped out and the woman next to me screamed bloody murder and leaned right into my side.

When you combine that, plus the family in the first row that wanted to pose, plus me deciding to be that guy who looks the other way as if they can’t see the Carnotaurus, plus Mom who always looks vaguely emotionless in these ride photos until now, you get this:

My seatmate had fistfuls of her husband’s shirt and screamed so loud I still can’t believe it. I was doubled over laughing when I saw the ride photo.

We spent some time in the gift shop after the ride, where I picked up my first souvenirs of the trip! I got a reversible tote bag with a t-rex on one side and a brontosaurus on the other, along with a little plush brontosaurus that was too cute for words! He sits on my bookshelf now and reminds me of our wonderful day. (I’ll include pics of all souvenirs at the end of the TR.)
We decided we wanted another frozen chai before we left the park, so it was back to Asia. On the way, we stopped on the Everest Bridge for some Photopass pictures!

Look, Simba and friends, I get Hakuna Matata and all, but share the path!

We made our way to Royal Anandapur and there was a little Bollywood dance show going on with a few dancers. We stopped to watch for a little while with our chais, and noticed that the dancers were encouraging people to join in, but no one except a couple little kids had jumped in. Then a couple college-aged guys joined in, then their friends joined in, and that broke the ice and by the time we left, there were a whole bunch of people of all ages dancing!

The best kind of Disney Magic, IMHO.

With our chais, we walked back around to see the Tree of Life, but first stopped to see one of my favourite parts of AK, the monkeys! I’m notorious for wanting to watch these monkeys for ages. They were chasing each other around their playground. SO cute.

And of course, we remembered to get pictures by the Tree with our chais this time.


We were going to take on one of the walking trails, but by this point in the day we were way too exhausted to do so. It was about 2:30 and we were ready to hit the road! But on our way out of the park, we spotted Dug and Russell and decided to hop in line for one more character meet before we left.

In front of us in line were a guy and one of his kids in a stroller, and he struck up a conversation with Mom and I about how his wife was running in to buy an ear hat with his other kid. We chatted a bit and found out that they are also Canadian, and we lamented the awful winter we had this year and the unpredictable weather. He showed us a picture of their hometown in Alberta, and they’d been hit with an awful blizzard while our hometown in Ontario was having temperatures that rivaled the ones we had in Florida. Canada is SO weird.

We bid our new friends farewell when they were the last to meet Dug and Russell before their break, but luckily Dug and Russell came back in just a few minutes! Dug is so soft and cuddly, and Russell admired my pins as badges even though I had none of him or Dug. They were adorable!

After meeting Dug and Russell, we stopped for Photopass one more time and browsed the main gift shop before leaving the park.

We had a fantastic day at Animal Kingdom, and we’re already looking forward to our next trip! This was our only day at this park, but it was one of the best days of our trip.


We were looking forward to going back to Pop Century for a nap before a cool evening of fun…

Up Next: Chapter 11! “Best Mac and Cheese of My Life”, or, Eating and Browsing at Downtown Disney!
​

 

[Gracefulskinny]

That is NOT somewhere I ever want to get stuck!

Tell me about it!

This photo is just to show the demonic-looking lion that was on the wall behind me for the entirety of our meal. The entire room was covered in murals of demonic-looking animals. So fun!

​

 

[nilla]

With our chais, we walked back around to see the Tree of Life, but first stopped to see one of my favourite parts of AK, the monkeys! I’m notorious for wanting to watch these monkeys for ages. They were chasing each other around their playground. SO cute.

They're actually apes, not monkeys. You can tell by their lack of tails. Thanks, random AK Cast Member for that bit of knowledge

They are fun to watch, though. We noticed their tightrope from the main tower to the one farther away was gone this year, which made me sad.

We chatted a bit and found out that they are also Canadian, and we lamented the awful winter we had this year and the unpredictable weather.

Unpredictable? But the guy at the Canada pavilion said it snows 365 days a year in Canada. What gives?

Great updates, as usual, and it sounds like another fun day. I love AK, because there's so much to do, and most of it isn't a really huge deal if you miss it. Very relaxing.

Plus, it has gorillas.

Can't wait to read more!

 

[princessesandpascal]

I think the Pascal magic shot would've been better had you been holding a plastic fork in the other hand.

I should really stock up on a bunch next time for props. The butterflies, though, would be a bit harder to grab with it.

Tell me about it!

It sounded awful!

(If the lion is that bad, the zebras were worse! We don't have a great photo of them, but they were terrifying!)

They're actually apes, not monkeys. You can tell by their lack of tails. Thanks, random AK Cast Member for that bit of knowledge

They are fun to watch, though. We noticed their tightrope from the main tower to the one farther away was gone this year, which made me sad.

Unpredictable? But the guy at the Canada pavilion said it snows 365 days a year in Canada. What gives?

Great updates, as usual, and it sounds like another fun day. I love AK, because there's so much to do, and most of it isn't a really huge deal if you miss it. Very relaxing.

Plus, it has gorillas.

Can't wait to read more!

I had no idea! Passing on that AK knowledge

I know right? It's almost as if stereotypes aren't real. But really, our weather is horrifying. It would almost be easier if it snowed everyday, I'd actually know what to expect. Yikes.

Thank you! AK has definitely surpassed DHS as my third favourite park, and it's slowly but surely creeping up on Epcot. Next time I'm planning on two mornings there to make sure we get the walking trails in as well. There's so much to see and we only touched a very small fraction of the park.

 

[Meeko5]

You and your mom are adorable, I would have loved seeing mother/daughter trip like this, damn my 4 siblings ruining that for me

That last dinosaur photo is amazeballs, as my 6 year old says. You're really making me want to buy the MM after I had sworn it off!

 

[Cando86]

Wow, I can't believe how much you got done at AK! We also LOVED our AK day last trip and thought it was one of our best days too! It's really such a great park.

I totally agree with you on the Australia section - that would be AMAZING!

I not so secretly love Disney pizza...Pizza Planet is one of my favs... So many people hate it, probably rightfully so

 

[sheila <3 WDW]

I am loving your trip report. Just found it and read it all.
My goal is to take a mother/daughter and mother/son trip with my kids. They are about 8 and 4 now. My DH might not be on board for that so IDK. I think we might start out with mom/daughter day on a current trip where DH and I split up and each go do whatever we want with one kid. Lol

 

[princessesandpascal]

You and your mom are adorable, I would have loved seeing mother/daughter trip like this, damn my 4 siblings ruining that for me

That last dinosaur photo is amazeballs, as my 6 year old says. You're really making me want to buy the MM after I had sworn it off!

It was definitely a fun one! I guess that's an only child perk, though Mom did say if there was another one we'd probably still have done something like it!

MM ended up being a pretty good deal. We were happy with all the ride photos and such, but we had a lot of lacklustre photographers that made it a questionable deal. We'd do it again, likely. If you do, ask the photogs to take tons of photos when you encounter them, telling them you have MM often makes them take more!

Wow, I can't believe how much you got done at AK! We also LOVED our AK day last trip and thought it was one of our best days too! It's really such a great park.

I totally agree with you on the Australia section - that would be AMAZING!

I not so secretly love Disney pizza...Pizza Planet is one of my favs... So many people hate it, probably rightfully so

Looking back, it was a really full day! It felt really relaxed which was nice. It was a very low-crowd day despite EMH, it felt like there was hardly anyone in the park even though that wasn't the case!

I'm holding out hope!

I know, right? It's probably not the most technically "good" pizza, but it's associated with the memories which maybe makes it so good. Memory-infused pizza

I am loving your trip report. Just found it and read it all.
My goal is to take a mother/daughter and mother/son trip with my kids. They are about 8 and 4 now. My DH might not be on board for that so IDK. I think we might start out with mom/daughter day on a current trip where DH and I split up and each go do whatever we want with one kid. Lol

Welcome! Thanks for joining in!

I've heard of a lot of DISers doing that. Starting off with a boys/girls day on a future trip sounds like a great way to start!!

 

[KathyM2]

Luckily, the line took us past the porcupines, who we watched for a bit.

That's so awesome! Those porcupines actually look pretty big...I guess I thought they were smaller...they must have different types lol

I was doubled over laughing when I saw the ride photo.

That is one of the funniest Dinosaur pics I've seen.

 

[harambetheaterhobo]

Hi Shannon! I just caught up on your report. You guys are having so much fun, I love it!

OMG that Dinosaur ride photo....everyone's face is perfect. Love that guy in front of your mom too.

That picture of you, Russell, and Dug is too cute!

I'm glad you guys had such a great time at AK! This used to be our half-day park, but on my last trip I fell in love with it and can't wait until I can go back. It was probably the best day of our trip!

 

[princessesandpascal]

That's so awesome! Those porcupines actually look pretty big...I guess I thought they were smaller...they must have different types lol

That is one of the funniest Dinosaur pics I've seen.

I think they were. I can't remember exactly what they were called, but they definitely weren't North American ones! They were huge and the best part was the CMs with their little shields while they were playing with them.

I wish it recorded the sound of her scream when it popped out: it was hilarious!

Hi Shannon! I just caught up on your report. You guys are having so much fun, I love it!

OMG that Dinosaur ride photo....everyone's face is perfect. Love that guy in front of your mom too.

That picture of you, Russell, and Dug is too cute!

I'm glad you guys had such a great time at AK! This used to be our half-day park, but on my last trip I fell in love with it and can't wait until I can go back. It was probably the best day of our trip!

Thanks for joining in! It was a really fun week!

Me too! It looked like the whole family wanted to pose and he took it to the next level of enthusiasm. It was great!

It did for us too. I think it was because we didn't go early, so we arrived in the heat of the day and it was sticky and miserable. FP+ isn't really needed at this park but it helps us make sure we get everything in that we want to get done. Definitely more time next trip for it!