Let me sneak in an update real quick-like, while I have a few minutes...
Day 8: I get mad, we have fun, Ben gets mad
We woke up this morning at 7:30AM and headed to Captain Cook's for breakfast. In general, we had good luck with eating here and finding a table as long as we were there before 8AM. It's a pretty small place for such a big resort, and most of the seating is outside in the stanky gross heat (it was so hot this trip, that I'd start sweating as soon as we left the room, even early in the day).
Anyway, I had Tonga Toast again (I don't eat the edges, so it's not
that much food...
right?) and Ben had the breakfast sandwich sliders (bacon egg and cheese). The food was fine and we were done pretty quickly.
We waited at the bus stop for just a moment before our bus pulled up. We were finally headed to Animal Kingdom!
I talked a bit in my Pre-trip Report about this park and the fact that we are odd ducks: we don't really care for the Safari ride. It's very well done and I enjoy the animals, but I just don't get the thrill others do by looking at them over and over. Still, I've been on it at least once every trip and every time wonder why I rode it again. This trip we decided that we don't have to ride something just because it's the popular ride in the park. So that meant we were headed to the Animal Kingdom and didn't need to rush right to the Safari with everyone else.
Without even trying to, we did make it for the park opening.
I was surprised to see that the opening ceremony/show was being held right at the entrance. I remember being let in the park up to the tree and the show happening up there. When did they change this?
While we waited, we were realizing that it was HOT outside. Like really hot. So hot that I actually wrote it in my notes from the trip even though this was our 8th day in the heat and we should've been used to it by now (yeah, I took notes on this trip. I'm a dork.)
That's me, waiting to get in the park. And being hot.
Once we were let in, we headed straight to Everest. There was no wait at all, so we walked right on. Actually, we did that a couple times! I love this ride- I happened to make a few trips to WDW the year it was being built and got to see the progression of the construction. I remember being so excited to finally ride it and it didn't disappoint! It was a little sad because this was my first time riding it since the Yeti stopped working and that was such a cool part of the ride... but not a huge deal and I can still hope they'll figure out how to use it again at some point...
One on of our rides, we posed for the picture
Since they charge about $17,000 for these, we just took a picture of it instead of buying one. I had walked away from the screens, not realizing the Ben was taking another picture. A woman standing near by saw what he was doing and said to her husband something like, "Who would take a picture of the picture?"
She obviously didn't realize that I was with Ben and that I could clearly hear what she said. At first I was mad, but then I realized that I am nosy and not good at minding my business, either. I also put my foot in my mouth a
lot, and I am sure that I have done this sort of thing a bunch of times without realizing it. So this just served as a lesson to me to watch what I say in the future because it isn't fun to overhear someone talking about you.
See? Animal Kingdom
is an educational park!
Anyway, having ridden EE a bunch of times, it was still only a little after 9AM when we headed toward Dinoland. The path from Asia to Dinoland was completely empty. It felt like we were the only people in the whole park!
We rode Dinosaur (a ride I happen to really enjoy, though I know it is not super popular among DISers) and were very sad to come back out into the heat. We tried to cool down in the gift shop, but it wasn't very cool in there. We were fading fast and getting grouchy.
Though I did manage to pose for this picture
After taking this, I realized it was a smoking spot. That explained why it smelled the way it did over there!
On the way out of Dinoland, we spotted a CM drawing with water. He had already finished quite a few.
I was especially happy to see Darkwing Duck!
Our next goal was to make it for the Festival of the Lion King that was starting pretty soon. Ben really didn't think he was gonna like this, but I was convinced that when he saw it, he'd get all the 'Disney Magic' of it and agree that we needed to come back next fall.
WAIT! I just realized that I never talked about this...
Ahem, bear with me a moment here...
Before we left for this trip, I had already booked an early October 2011 trip to take advantage of free dining, Food & Wine Festival,
MNSSHP, and to celebrate my birthday (which at the time I thought was my 30th because I can't count. It will actually be my 31st. Don't laugh.) Ben knew about this and agreed with it. At some point during the week, before this AK day, he had made a comment about not wanting to come back the next year and it got me pissy.
I had not made it a secret how much I enjoy WDW and that I would always want a yearly trip if possible. Now he is telling me that the trip that is already booked isn't really something he wants to do?
At this point in the trip, on our AK day, I was convinced that he didn't actually like WDW and was just humoring me and it was really bugging me. But for some reason, I thought that the FOTLK was the key to bringing us back on the same page. I guess I forgot that Ben doesn't much care for theater. Or shows. But at least it has A/C!
So that is what was happening for me mentally, as we hurried over to Camp Minnie Mickey. I just hoped we'd make it in time for the show!
Up next: Do we see Lion King? Can I forgive Ben for not being the Disney freak I am? And how in the heck can I write so much about a park that we were only in for 3 hours?
Like really really mad. But now I think it is a funny picture and really helps me remember what that particular moment felt like. 
AK is my least favorite park and it is so gosh darned hot that it is uncomfortable and I always get mad when I'm there. My DH says WDW is fine but he wants to go other places. So it is all eerily familiar!
