After a good night’s rest, we were up and very excited for our first full day at Disney! I put the “coffee” on to brew, showered and we all had a bite to eat. (Mostly we had brought breakfast bars for the morning to go with our coffee!) Unfortunately we did not get out as early as I had hoped, but we finally made it to Animal Kingdom!!!
After looking at our maps, it was decided we would go to see the Lion King show, since it was due to start in 15 min! What a great show!!! We sat in the giraffe section and got to make a noise like them. What do giraffe’s sound like???? (We all sounded like goats!) I just loved the monkeys! They were very funny and very talented gymnasts! There was the one dancer who flies above the stage who was absolutely beautiful! So graceful!!! I would never have the nerve to do that! The there were the 4 singers who all had great voices! There were so many aspects of the show that we enjoyed, I’ll just say we liked the whole thing!
From there we walked around a little and decided we would get some lunch. We had CS and I don’t even remember where. I do know Roz & I split a salad and a sandwich. As we were leaving, we ran into this guy:
After we took pictures, he said he and his friends were going to play & dance and we needed to go with them. Pam says; “Gayle will dance with you!” and we all followed them over. Now, I just love dancing! I can not hear music with a good beat without moving to it! So they started playing as a crowd gathered. Here is a video of them playing:
When they finished, they started pulling people from the audience to dance with them. The tall man took me by my hand and led me into the group where we learned some dance moves by following the leader. After a little bit, he pulled 4 people to the front and had them follow his moves. He then pulled the next group, me being one of them. He blew his whistle at me and told me to go back into the line! But I didn’t do anything!!! I thought I was being punished for some reason! After that group, he pulled a young girl and me out of the line and put us in front. The band started to play, he blew his whistle and through body language told us to do our own thing! What a blast!!!
He then got in line with us and showed us some steps. After a little bit he took her hand and my hand and raised them as if we were the winners! The crowd clapped and we just beamed! I had sooo much fun being able to do this! I have always been “dramatic” but this was the best pixie dust I could have gotten! Here is the video of the end of the dance.
Afterwards the performers asked where I was born, “New Jersey”! They told me that was accidental and I should have been born in the Congo!! They said my new name was “Mama Moto” as “moto” means “fire” and I am just on fire!!! They were very sweet and helped make my day at Animal Kingdom a memorable one! This was just the first little bit of Pixie dust we would receive this day! There was more to come!
After dancing, we made our way over to the safari and it said it was a 30 min wait, so we got in line, since all the fast passes were gone for the day! As per Disney tradition, we talked to the families around us. It made the time go a little quicker and before we knew it we were boarding our safari truck! This was a lot of fun and of course we saved “Little Red” because we were the best safari participants out there! At one point there were zebras and ostriches blocking the road, so we had to wait for them to cross. Afterwards we were walking around and saw this rock:
Now, being from Buffalo we found this quite amusing and had to take a picture of it! (If you don’t think this is funny, just roll your eyes and move on…)
Walking through the Pengani Forest was very interesting. There were so many animals to see and learn about. My favorite, by far, are the gorillas! They are wonderful creatures and I swear this one was doing yoga and he watched all of us go by!
We had decided to go see Nemo, but first the parade was going to be starting very soon, so we staked out spots and took turns shopping while the rest of us stayed in our spots. Now, we had gotten there a good 30 min before the parade was to start, so we had very good seats. Five minutes before the start time, a family with two kids, around 5 & 7, come up behind us, push their stroller as close to us as possible and the mother proceeds to say in a loud voice, “well honey, I guess we’ll have to stay here behind these adults and hope you can see some of the parade!” Excuse me! I was here with plenty of time to spare and deserve every inch of my seat! If you wanted little Johnny and Sally to be in the front, you should have gotten here earlier and staked out your spot yourself! I am not giving it up no matter how much you push into me and complain loudly! (Now on a side note…this woman didn’t once ask us nicely if her children could stand in front of us. They wouldn’t have prohibited my view at all and I would have been happy to let them. However…. be snotty & nasty and I’m not even offering!!!) <vent over>
OK, so after the parade, we hightailed it over to Nemo to catch the last show of the day. I had been looking forward to this show, as I have heard mixed reviews of it and wanted to make my own decision. I thought it was very well done and the people on stage really didn’t distract me that much. I loved Dory and Crush and thought those actors were the best. It was nice to see “older” actors in some of the roles as it was fitting. As much as I liked it, MJ caught a nap during the show, as the “early-ish” morning caught up with her! By the time we got out of the show, the park had closed and we were being directed out. I was very disappointed, as I didn’t get to EE, Dinosaur or the rest of the park. I’ll catch these next time I go, I guess.
On our way out, we saw lines and realized there were characters there for photo ops. Judy loves Goofy and was sooo beside herself to be able to have her picture taken with him! She waited in line and then had her turn. (This was when we got our Photopass card and continued to use it throughout the next few days!)
From here we headed out and back to POR, as we needed to change and get ready for
MVMCP!!!!
UP NEXT: MVMCP
j/k
How dare she want you to move! She should've gotten there EARLY!!!!!! 
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