Can I get their name, please? Update 7/14

[caralyn817]

Good Morning Ya'll! Welcome to my first ever Trip Report, so bare with me! I have always read others trip reports and commented on them, but never fully written one myself. I am taking the leap and writing one. Now, if you enjoy it I will write more as we have a trip to Vero Beach Resort at the end of the month and a week long trip to the World at the end of July.

We always go up to Disney for Memorial Day Weekend. It officially starts the Summer for us. Well, everyday is summer for us since we live in South Florida. We are used to the hot, hot, HOT, steamy weather with showers each day. This weekend getaway was much needed for me, even though we still had 2 weeks left of school. This school year has been rough for me.

A little back story, in November I was given the opportunity to take on a Curriculum Coach position at another school. After much deliberation, I decided to take the position and leave the classroom full time. Everything was going good until February. That's when things changed between me and the principal. (Keep in mind that this is an inner city school.) Well, my hours were from 7am-5pm most days and she wanted me to stay until 9pm or later each night. I just couldn't do that to my daughter. (The principal and other coaches are young, not married, and don't have kids so they could do that.) Since, I wouldn't make that commitment (it was never in my contract when I signed on), I started to get looked down upon and treated differently. Things got worse and worse and worse. I ended up contacting people higher up because conditions were so bad. I had my resignation letter in hand and ready to hand over when a higher up person stepped in and transferred me to another location. I have been with them far longer than the principal and many others. They didn't want to loss me. Well, I started at the new location the following Monday. This position would only last until the end of the school year and then I didn't know where I would be. Would I either be there, at my old school, or a new school? Everything was up in the air for awhile. I wasn't sure if we would be going on this trip. I didn't want to spend money on the trip if I didn't have a job for next year. My parents and husband said no matter what, we were still going on this trip as I needed it. Finally, about 2 weeks before the trip the principal at my new school called me in and offered me a classroom position. I was completely ecstatic, as I have missed the classroom and wanted to go back dearly. I will be teaching Kindergarten again. My favorite!

Anywho, enough with the backstory. I just had to let you know how this trip came to be. Show let's get this show on the road!

Here's the cast of this trip report:

I'm Cara. I'm am a Disney Fanatic. I LOVE planning the trips and organizing everything. I am a Kindergarten Teacher during the day, a hairbow maker at night, and a full time mommy. I love Animal Kingdom and Kilimanjaro is my favorite ride. My favorite character is Tinkerbell. Gotta have that Pixie Dust!


My husband, Brett. He's also a teacher, so we get the same days off. He is a Math and Science Teacher. He'll say he's not Disney obsessed, but I beg to differ. He surprised me by booking a trip to Disney's Vero Beach Resort at the end of June and also, he was the one who suggested that we take a trip to Disney for a week at the end of July. He loves the thrill rides.

My parents, we'll call them Grammy and Papa. They are DVC owners and my enables. They have taken me to Disney so often that we have lost count. Now, they love to see the joy on their granddaugther's face. I don't know why but I don't have many pictures of them this trip. This one is taken from a previous trip. Disregard my daughter's face in the photo, she was trying to act like a pirate and saying "Arggg!" Silly girl!

Here is the main star of the show. Bayleigh- our little princess. She loves, loves, loves Lion King. I can't tell what her favorite thing was this trip as it was constantly changing.

We left around 4:30pm on May 23rd. Our trip there was very uneventful. It seemed to take forever, but I think that was just the anticipation of getting there. We finally pulled up to this sign.
This would be our home for the weekend. We couldn't wait to get to our room. We booked a Savanna view room. We asked for the Zebra trail. We had pixie dust as we got the same room we got in the past and loved the view of a watering hole that lots of animals would visit each day.

After dropping our bags in the room, we quickly ran down and got something to eat from Mara. DH an I shared a salad and a Chicken Flatbread. My parents got burgers and Bayleigh got a snack of fruit, as she already ate. We quickly ate and then went to bed as we were getting up early and it was already late.

Which park would we go to tomorrow?

 

[tinkgurl]

We were there at the same time! I'm interested to see if we were at any of the same parks!

 

[caralyn817]

We were there at the same time! I'm interested to see if we were at any of the same parks!

Thanks for stopping by. I started reading your trip report as well. It would be interesting to see if we were are the same parks on some of the days.

 

[caralyn817]

Last I left off, we had just gotten to Animal Kingdom Lodge-Jambo House and just went to bed.

Friday morning May 24th, I woke up at 6am and went out to our balcony while everyone else still slept. There wasn't many animals out near us this morning. I wasn't able to get any good pictures that early because of the lighting. A short while later my mom joined me on the balcony. We chatted for a bit and then went inside to get ready. Brett, my dad, and Bayleigh were all still sleeping. After we got ready, my dad was already awake sitting on the balcony and I woke Brett. The guys got ready while mom and I made breakfast. Bayleigh woke up shortly after. I don't wake her up when we are on trips as she tends to be very grouchy in the mornings. Bayleigh wanted to eat breakfast outside on the balcony so she could see the animals. This is what we saw that morning.

Cranes

A giraffe

Same giraffe just bending down more

After breakfast, I quickly got Bayleigh ready for the day. She fussed a little bit because she didn't want to leave the animals. Papa was able to coax her out of the room. So, downstairs we went to the bus stop. Here we are waiting for the bus.



Bayleigh's shirt has a little clue as to where we were going that day. Let's see who notices it and can guess where we are headed.

 

[caralyn817]

Shortly after taking those pictures, our bus arrived and we were on our way to...
This is my favorite park. I know, I know, many of you don't like the park that much, but I LOVE it! The theming, the music, the atmosphere, the shows, the rides, and of course the ANIMALS. My daughter LOVES this park as well.

We quickly made our way through the bag check and headed over to Guest Relations, because we wanted to exchange our paper tickets for the new cards. We got our tickets quickly and headed through the new Mickey turnstiles. We made our way to the left and saw that an anteater was up.
This was the best shot I could get as it was walking around very quickly. We watched for a minute and then made our way to Kilimanjaro Safari. The wait time said 20 minutes so we hoped in line. The line quickly moved but we went down paths that I never knew they had. Here's Brett and Bayleigh in line.
There was only two times when the line stopped moving for us. The first one was on the bridge over the trucks. Here was our view while waiting.
The second time was while waiting to board our vehicle. All the trucks were backed up and the cast members were all looking around very confused. No one could figure out what was going on. We all thought that maybe an animal was probably blocking the road. We stood there for about 5 minutes, when we finally see a woman being escorted down the road from one of the vehicles by a cast member. They came up the stairs by where they let you on and then through a gate and out. Still have no clue what happened. Maybe she changed her mind about riding. Well, we got our seats and were on our way.
Bayleigh could hardly wait.

She had to have her Minnie purse on her arm just in case she needed it.

First up was our friend the rhino.


As we went on, we saw some people starting off on the "Wild Africa Trek". My dad and husband both want to do this. I think we will surprise them one day and have them, while us girls go do something else like the Princess Tea Party. We'll see. So, up next was the hippos.

I'm always hoping that one day I will be able to get a good shot of one of them with their mouth open.
Then, some crocs.

Now on to the Savanna, we were greeted by this guy right away.

We saw so many giraffes on our journey.


We also saw some elephants. Bayleigh LOVES the "phants".



We then came upon another rhino. He was just laying around.


Last time we rode this ride, we narrowly escaped being peed on by a rhino. Our driver was stopped by a rhino in the road and there was one on the right side of the vehicle. We had a lovely view of his back side. Well, the one in front decided to move and thank goodness, because right after we moved the rhino on our right decided he needed to go to the bathroom and let it loose. Well, it sprayed like a fire hose releasing it's water. If we would have still been sitting there, we would have been soaked. I've always wondered if anything like that has happened to anyone before.
We then got to see a warthog, who just finished its mud bath.

Unfortunately, we didn't get to see any lions as they were hiding and no zebras. Hopefully, one of these days we'll get to see them.

 

[tinkgurl]

Aw boo, we were at Epcot during the day on the 24th. Bummer.

Looks like you got some good KS pictures of all the animals!

Love that Bayleigh had her Minnie purse "just in case" she needed it!

 

[MeMom]

I am sitting in a very nice three bedroom cottage at Vero right now. I can hear the waves washing up on the beach. It is so relaxing. We are staying here with kind DVC friends who asked us to share in their beach fun for a few days. The girls have done a few of the activities, but mostly they like the swimming pool, of course.

I enjoyed the safari pictures. I wonder if the person who was taken away maybe got physically sick or fainted or something.

I like the picture of your family waiting at the bus stop. Papa looks ready to roll!

 

[wiigirl]

Great pics!

 

[caralyn817]

Aw boo, we were at Epcot during the day on the 24th. Bummer.

Looks like you got some good KS pictures of all the animals!

Love that Bayleigh had her Minnie purse "just in case" she needed it!

She carried her Minnie purse with her everywhere. She got upset the first time we went through security and had to hand it to them to check. Then, she got the hang of it. Minnie did get upgraded at the end of the trip.

I am sitting in a very nice three bedroom cottage at Vero right now. I can hear the waves washing up on the beach. It is so relaxing. We are staying here with kind DVC friends who asked us to share in their beach fun for a few days. The girls have done a few of the activities, but mostly they like the swimming pool, of course.

I enjoyed the safari pictures. I wonder if the person who was taken away maybe got physically sick or fainted or something.

I like the picture of your family waiting at the bus stop. Papa looks ready to roll!

The cottage sounds amazing. We'll be staying in one of the Inn rooms however. A little over a week until we head up there.

As for the woman on the ride, we have no clue. She looked perfectly fine. We thought maybe she didn't read the ride warnings beforehand and then decided she wanted off. She was probably in her early 30s.

Great pics!

Thanks for joining! More to come.

 

[caralyn817]

So I am very disappointed right now, I just wrote an entire post and lost it all. Ugh! Well, I'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile, but life has gotten in the way. We have Bayleigh's 3rd Birthday. Then, we went to Disney's Vero Beach Resort for a short getaway. I'm debating whether or not to post about that. Let me know if you are interested. Anywho, we left off with us ending out journey on our safari. We decided to do what we always do right after and walk the Pangani Trail. First up the Okapi.

We then made our way to the meerkats.





I love watching these little guys. We got to talk to one of their keepers. He told us a lot about them. Did you know that there are only 3 meerkats in the exhibit? Yup, three and they are all males. He told us that if they had females then they would breed like rabbits and they would know what to do with all of the babies. Very interesting!
Well, while we were there a little someone decided to take a break.

This became a routine with every bench or seat.
We then made our way to the gorillas.
This was the only gorilla we saw and he was obviously tired. So, we made the most of it with a ride on Daddy's shoulders.


After our walk, we decided to stop for a snack. DH and I shared a jalapeno cheese pretzel, Bayleigh had some fruit, and my parents had plain pretzels. When we were done I looked at the times guide and noticed that Lion King was going to start in 15 minutes. We decided to venture over there. We weren't expecting to have great seats, but just wanted to get into some AC and enjoy Bayleigh's favorite show. Well, we entered and were getting ready to find our spots in the back when a cast member came over and told us to follow her. Pixie Dust! She lead us across the follow to some reserved seats in the 3rd row. We were very close.

We were in the elephant section.








One very excited little girl!

DH's favorite part

 

[caralyn817]

After the show, we made our way over to Flame Tree for lunch. Sorry folks I didn't take pictures here. I was starving! When we were done, we headed over to Dinoland to ride Triceratops Spin. DH, Bayleigh, and I were going to ride. My parents decided to sit out and watch us. Well, as we were walking Bayleigh saw Goofy and Pluto. Let me give you a little back story here. Bayleigh use to be fine with the characters, then all of a sudden she wanted nothing to do with them. She would freak out every time she saw one and would do the koala death grip on my arm if we got to close to them. So, imagine our surprise when she said "I want to hug them!" DH and I gave each other the look and we continued on. Well, while waiting for the ride all she would talk about was seeing them. Then, throughout the whole ride she would point to the them every time we would pass them. We got off the ride and started to head back to my parents, when she halted and wouldn't budge. DH and I decided that we would give it a try. I got in line with Bayleigh while he went to get my parents. He then joined me in line. While in line, Bayleigh saw the characters signing autographs and taking pictures. I was talking to her about what would happen the whole time. This is where the title came from. She then looked at me and said "You mean you get there name!" Her face lite up and I quickly had DH get my mom. I had her run to the nearest store to get an autograph book and pen. I wasn't prepared for this. Well, it was finally our turn. I was prepared for her to run. This is what we got.

Some break action. Haha!

A little better

Giving Goofy five!

Wanting nothing to do with Pluto

Well, we survived. She made it. There was no crying, freaking out, or running away. We did get a five which is touching. No hugs however. She was over the moon with the autographs and kept showing them to us. After our encounter, we made our way out of the park, but stopped to get this.

She fell asleep on the bus ride back to AKL. So now the question for all of you, will she want to see the characters again? What do you think?

 

[MeMom]

I would like to hear your thoughts on Vero. We enjoyed it, but Jill and I agreed it would be a better way to end a WDW trip than replace one. We can see how it would be nice to wind things down and gradually re-enter the real world again after a week of park time. We didn't think the staff overall was 'on' as far as being Disney friendly, although there were still some good cast members.

The girls enjoyed the pool, and they did some of the activities in Community Hall.

The cottage itself was wonderful, and sitting on the balcony feeling the ocean breeze and hearing the water lapping onto shore was very relaxing.

Glad Bayleigh didn't run screaming from the characters.

 

[Goofy442]

I love AK and yes most people think it's a waste of a park. You took really good pictures on the safari, what kind of camera was it. Yes, I as well would love to hear about Vero Beach.

 

[caralyn817]

I would like to hear your thoughts on Vero. We enjoyed it, but Jill and I agreed it would be a better way to end a WDW trip than replace one. We can see how it would be nice to wind things down and gradually re-enter the real world again after a week of park time. We didn't think the staff overall was 'on' as far as being Disney friendly, although there were still some good cast members.

The girls enjoyed the pool, and they did some of the activities in Community Hall.

The cottage itself was wonderful, and sitting on the balcony feeling the ocean breeze and hearing the water lapping onto shore was very relaxing.

Glad Bayleigh didn't run screaming from the characters.

We liked Vero. It's a different experience than we are used to. Eventhough we live 20 minutes from the beach, we hardly ever go, but enjoyed the peacefulness up there. We're going back for Labor Day weekend with my parents. I'm definitely going to post pics on here about it. We were extremely happy that she didn't cry. I was in shock. Stick around to see if she wants to see more.

I love AK and yes most people think it's a waste of a park. You took really good pictures on the safari, what kind of camera was it. Yes, I as well would love to hear about Vero Beach.

Thank you so much for joining. I'm glad I'm not the only one who loves AK. My camera is a Nikon Coolpix L810. I love it. I'll definitely be sharing our experience at Vero Beach.

 

[caralyn817]

So I woke up this morning with sinus draining and a little irritation in my throat. I'm going to try to rest today as we leave in 6 days for Disney. It's crazy that I haven't started packing or getting things ready. Ahhh!

Anywho, the last we left of we just returned to back to AKL. Bayleigh feel asleep on the bus ride back so we placed her in the stroller for the walk back to the room.
She had her new Nala and I was not going to remove her from the stroller. She is NOT a happy camper when she wakes up and will be cranky if we do it too early. We left her there to nap. DH and my Dad also decided to lay down and take a nap. My mom and I decided to go out on the balcony and see if we could see any animals. Here is what we saw:

Some piggies deciding to cool off with a quick dip.


Some pelicans decided to join in.

A giraffe

A crane


Some guests out of a tour

The piggies roaming

Another giraffe


Piggies in the water again

Closeup of a giraffe

A little while later, everyone was up and hungry. We decided to eat off property at one of our favorite BBQ places, Four Rivers. It's a little bit of a drive to Winter Garden but it is well worth it. We hit it up every time we go. The line is always out the door. We'll be going up on Saturday and will be going there sometime during our stay. I will take pics of it when we go.

After our dinner outing, we returned to AKL to go swimming and the guys had to watch the Heat game. Before it got dark, we saw a giraffe getting water. I love watching the animals.


Before bed, Bayleigh needed to burn off some energy so my mom and I took her down to the arcade.
Some bowling



Racing


We refilled our mugs, grabbed some zebra domes, and headed back up to the guys who were deep into the game.

That's all for now. I'm going to go put a load of laundry in and make some breakfast. Have a good Sunday everyone!

 

[Goofy442]

My kids love BBQ, will have to remember Four Rivers for next time. Love the animal pictures, it must have been hot. They do a safari at the resort that's new?

 

[punkin413]

Subbing! Be back later to catch up.

 

[punkin413]

All caught up! Bayleigh is just adorable! What a cutie. Your views from your savanna view room are just great. I want to stay there one day! Great safari pics. Oh, and I'm so glad Bayleigh decided to brave some characters. Kids are so unpredictable! Seth wasn't scared of them but he would just get all shy when they'd get close to us, then he'd cry when they left. They keep us on our toes, huh??