Touring the Animal Kingdom: Dinoland!
Dinoland was really, really empty. Like ghost town empty. I half expected tumbleweed to start rolling by
We circled around looking for everybody else and found my parents pretty quickly. No sign of everybody else, though. We figured the Boneyard was a logical starting point for them, so thats where we waited:
(Jason, Anne, me, and my mom)
For the next 10-20 minutes or so, our family members kept arriving and leaving. A couple would run off in search of water. Then a couple would go to use the bathrooms. Nobody in Jasons family had eaten breakfast at the hotel, so they were searching for food. (Dinoland didnt have any counter service.) A few of my cousins showed up, and then we had to do introductions for everybody. Our flower girl and her dad played in the Boneyard for a while, but we really werent making any progress. Im thinking: this group thing just isnt going to work for us!
I was hoping that wed all (except for babies and old people who dont like rides) go on Dinosaur together, but who knew how long itd take for our group of (now) 15 people to get in the same place at the same time. So I suggested that anybody who wanted to go on Primeval Whirl would do that. Usually I dont like spinning rides, but this one wasnt too bad. More silly than sickening. Right at my threshold for too-spinny. I kept cracking up laughing at all the little turns and spins. We had fun! My younger cousin was excited about riding in the car with Jason and me:
After that, we went to Dinosaur with as much of the group as we could find. There was hardly any line. While we were waiting, the phone calls and texts began. Mostly, they were from one of my uncles, the same one who called a couple times the day before. Now, we had given all our guests a pretty detailed itinerary (which is how my other cousins knew where to find us.) And this uncle in particular had mentioned getting the welcome gifts/letters. Said they were adorable. For AK, we told everybody when wed be arriving and what our route would be. But he kept calling/texting, Were at X. Where are you? So at the time, I found his texts pretty annoying. Just find us already!! Dont expect me to come looking for you! At the same time, I was also getting random texts from other friends/family all day, telling me about their travel progress, whether they were annoyed by people in the plane, what they thought of the lobby, etc. On the one hand, it was nice that our guests were so excited about Disney and wanted to share with me, but at the same time, I also just wanted to enjoy the AK with the guests who were there with me
By the end of the day, my uncle and his family never managed to meet up with us, so they told us they were going to Epcot for the evening and maybe wed want to meet up with them. I was like, sure, well just ditch all our other guests who have been told were going to the Boardwalk tonight to hang out with your family

But I was nice and just said, sorry. we have other plans. Well, it turns out that he never saw the itinerary that was on the second page of our welcome letter!!

Another uncle told me the story after the wedding: the pestering uncle was in my other uncles room the morning of the wedding when he spotted our itinerary and exclaimed, WHERE DID YOU GET THIS?? THIS IS WHAT WE NEEDED! When I heard that, I felt really badly that he had actually tried so hard to meet up with us but was never able to. I would have liked to spend some time with those cousins before the wedding, but it just never worked out. (And that family flew home the same day as the wedding.) Anyway, that was a long side story. Back to the AK portion of the TR
We all had fun on Dinosaur! This is a picture of the screen. One of my cousins bought us all the nice printed pictures but ours went home with my parents, so I cant post the good/real version yet. If I remember, Ill replace this with the better version when I get it. 8 of us are in the first two rows:
When we exit the ride, we find my mom and Jasons dad enjoying some shade with the baby. My cousins were very excited about the baby. Jasons dad was pretty patient but I could tell he was getting annoyed by all the poking. Somehow my mom managed to tactfully intercede and get them to ease up a little:
Then Jasons sister, brother-in-law, mom, and our FG joined us. Were finally all together! AND they just all won the Year-of-a-Million-Dreams FASTPASSes as they were coming off the TriceraTop Spin ride!!! So theyre all excited about that.

They figure they can quickly go on Dinosaur now while the rest of us slowly make our way towards Expedition Everest. So, up next: Asia and Africa