This is my first post, so bear with me....
Teacher workdays on Monday and Tuesday, so we all headed out Friday night after work/school:
Mom=39
Dad=39
DD1=8
DD2=5
DD3=2 1/2
Arrived very late at the AKL--what a wonderful place! Had a deluxe Savannah room view (although I'm pretty sure I only registered for a regular savannah) on the Kudu trail. Although they seemed to have lots of empty rooms (looked like at least one whole wing was shut off), they didn't have a room with bunk beds--good thing I hadn't told the kids in advance about that! No matter--they were just awestruck when they woke up the next morning to giraffes and ostriches and various other things we couldn't identify right off. Onsite, I've stayed at Carribbean Beach and Contemp previously, but next time, I'm heading back to AKL. It was just awesome.
Got ourselves together to go to Boma for breakfast the next morning--liked it so much we ended up eating there almost every morning! Then headed off to AK for the day. Loved it, but we could have used another half a day. There's an awful lot of stuff that we missed. Took full advantage of FastPass where available, which is a great system. Can't understand why some people would stand in line for 45+ minutes.... Just wish you could hold more than one FP at a time. (Actually, if you time it right, you can hold 2 at a time.) Saw a good number of characters at AK. The Lion King show is the best--could have done without Tarzan Rocks. And I wouldn't recommend taking kids under 8 on the Dinosaur ride! My 8 yo was ok with it, but just barely.
Went to Epcot for dinner. Had no problems getting PS at Marrakesh in Morocco, but noticed that lines at the different food kiosks throughout the world seemed to be about 10 deep on average. Seems like lots of people headed over to Epcot once all the other parks closed.
On Sunday, decided to do MGM even though soap starts were there. Wasn't really as bad as we thought. Although it was certainly crowded, most people were in lines to snap pics of stars or talk to them. Since we had zero interest in any of that, we went straight for the rides/shows with generally very little wait. Still used FP, though, because some things like Rock and Roller Coaster and ToT still had standby lines of 30+ minutes. (Once you make it through the first few seconds of R&RC, it is an awesome ride!!!) DD2 and DD3 loved the Playhouse Disney show, and of course Little Mermaid. Would have liked to have done the Millionaire thing, but all tix were distributed by early afternoon. Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground is temporarily closed for refurb. There were a few characters walking around, but really not many. They had several soap star related parades going on that day, so maybe they were all saving their energy for that. Skipped the parade to do the backlot tour, but if I had to do it over again, I would have gone to the parade and skipped backlot. I've seen backlot 2X before, and my kids really couldn't have cared less about it. Plus, DD2 was a little scared about it. Easily did just about everything in MGM in that one day. Even got to see a few soap stars, although I had no idea who they were! Skipped Fantasmic because we wanted to bo back to the hotel and swim in the HUGE AK pool!
Had dinner at Jiko (AKL). Awesome food and wine--all the wine is S. African, and the picks were great. If you can get past the $6 for pb&j and goldfish for the kids, it's still a great place to go with kids. Doesn't fill up as much as Boma. Atmosphere is casual enough, service fast. Best dish we had was the monkfish. And I swore I would go back every night for the pistachio creme brulee with chocolate! (Ended up eating there 2X because the next night, we wanted to eat dinner at Boma. Went down at 8:30pm, only to be told there was a one hour wait! Only 10 minute wait at Jiko.)
Finally off on a rainy Monday morning to MK. Thought the rain would keep the crowds out, but NO! Everyone in the world must have had a teacher workday on Monday! Ol' Dumbo had those 30+ minute waits within an hour of opening--climbed up to 60+ minutes after noon. The new Aladdin ride is basically the same thing, but lines no where near as long. So, got our FP for Jungle Cruise, rode Aladdin, went to the Tiki Room show, and made it back just as it was time to go on the Jungle Cruise. This turned out to be our strategy for the day--enter an area, go get whatever had a FP available, then do other stuff there 'til time for the FP entrance. It worked really, really well. Ended up the day with a sprint to Toontown, where we all got to ride Goofy's Barnstormer over and over again--from 6:50 to 7:00 pm, I think we rode 5 or 6 times! But we weren't going to leave a moment before we had to! Ended up going back the next day for another MK filled day to see all the things we missed the first day, plus re-visit some favorites.
Best new attraction is Buzz Lightyear's ride--no matter where I was in MK, I kept hearing kids say "I want to go on BL again!" Cinderella's Surprise Celebration was a good opportunity to see all the characters--from a distance. But the guide map said there was a character meet and greet after the show, and I didn't see any meeting and greeting going on. As a matter of fact, this was the one big disappointment of MK--virtually no character sightings! Friar Tuck was at the entrance when we first came in. Of course, we saw Mickey at his house in Toontown. And we stood in line for 35 minutes (grrrr--but had to do it...) to meet Ariel in her grotto. And that's it--over two days! We got 15 character autographs in total from our 4 days--about half from the Character Caravan, and the remainder mostly from AK or MGM.
Which leads me to my final bit of news--the Character Caravan. The CC was at AKL on Sunday and Tuesday. It's advertised as running from 7:30-9:00, but that's not really the case. What happened at AKL was that they sent 4 characters out from 8:10-8:40, then the same 4 characters came back for another half and hour at 9:10. On Sunday, we had Baloo, King Louis, Rafiki and Timon. On Tuesday, we had the Queen of Hearts, White Rabbit, and Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. The couldn't tell us in advance what characters were going to be there, only that they didn't send the same ones all the time. So--before you head to your hotel lobby at 7:30 to see characters (like we did!), check with your front desk to get the real scoop on what's going to be happening.
Had a great time--wish we had another day or two so we could spend more time at Epcot and go back to AK. With shorter hours, couldn't take a break in the middle of the day to go back to the hotel, but DD3 managed to catch a few winks in the stroller, so it wasn't too bad. She didn't end up having any huge meltdown until we boarded the plane to go home! And it was mercifully brief!
So--that's my report off the top of my head--feel free to ask questions!
Teacher workdays on Monday and Tuesday, so we all headed out Friday night after work/school:
Mom=39
Dad=39
DD1=8
DD2=5
DD3=2 1/2
Arrived very late at the AKL--what a wonderful place! Had a deluxe Savannah room view (although I'm pretty sure I only registered for a regular savannah) on the Kudu trail. Although they seemed to have lots of empty rooms (looked like at least one whole wing was shut off), they didn't have a room with bunk beds--good thing I hadn't told the kids in advance about that! No matter--they were just awestruck when they woke up the next morning to giraffes and ostriches and various other things we couldn't identify right off. Onsite, I've stayed at Carribbean Beach and Contemp previously, but next time, I'm heading back to AKL. It was just awesome.
Got ourselves together to go to Boma for breakfast the next morning--liked it so much we ended up eating there almost every morning! Then headed off to AK for the day. Loved it, but we could have used another half a day. There's an awful lot of stuff that we missed. Took full advantage of FastPass where available, which is a great system. Can't understand why some people would stand in line for 45+ minutes.... Just wish you could hold more than one FP at a time. (Actually, if you time it right, you can hold 2 at a time.) Saw a good number of characters at AK. The Lion King show is the best--could have done without Tarzan Rocks. And I wouldn't recommend taking kids under 8 on the Dinosaur ride! My 8 yo was ok with it, but just barely.
Went to Epcot for dinner. Had no problems getting PS at Marrakesh in Morocco, but noticed that lines at the different food kiosks throughout the world seemed to be about 10 deep on average. Seems like lots of people headed over to Epcot once all the other parks closed.
On Sunday, decided to do MGM even though soap starts were there. Wasn't really as bad as we thought. Although it was certainly crowded, most people were in lines to snap pics of stars or talk to them. Since we had zero interest in any of that, we went straight for the rides/shows with generally very little wait. Still used FP, though, because some things like Rock and Roller Coaster and ToT still had standby lines of 30+ minutes. (Once you make it through the first few seconds of R&RC, it is an awesome ride!!!) DD2 and DD3 loved the Playhouse Disney show, and of course Little Mermaid. Would have liked to have done the Millionaire thing, but all tix were distributed by early afternoon. Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground is temporarily closed for refurb. There were a few characters walking around, but really not many. They had several soap star related parades going on that day, so maybe they were all saving their energy for that. Skipped the parade to do the backlot tour, but if I had to do it over again, I would have gone to the parade and skipped backlot. I've seen backlot 2X before, and my kids really couldn't have cared less about it. Plus, DD2 was a little scared about it. Easily did just about everything in MGM in that one day. Even got to see a few soap stars, although I had no idea who they were! Skipped Fantasmic because we wanted to bo back to the hotel and swim in the HUGE AK pool!
Had dinner at Jiko (AKL). Awesome food and wine--all the wine is S. African, and the picks were great. If you can get past the $6 for pb&j and goldfish for the kids, it's still a great place to go with kids. Doesn't fill up as much as Boma. Atmosphere is casual enough, service fast. Best dish we had was the monkfish. And I swore I would go back every night for the pistachio creme brulee with chocolate! (Ended up eating there 2X because the next night, we wanted to eat dinner at Boma. Went down at 8:30pm, only to be told there was a one hour wait! Only 10 minute wait at Jiko.)
Finally off on a rainy Monday morning to MK. Thought the rain would keep the crowds out, but NO! Everyone in the world must have had a teacher workday on Monday! Ol' Dumbo had those 30+ minute waits within an hour of opening--climbed up to 60+ minutes after noon. The new Aladdin ride is basically the same thing, but lines no where near as long. So, got our FP for Jungle Cruise, rode Aladdin, went to the Tiki Room show, and made it back just as it was time to go on the Jungle Cruise. This turned out to be our strategy for the day--enter an area, go get whatever had a FP available, then do other stuff there 'til time for the FP entrance. It worked really, really well. Ended up the day with a sprint to Toontown, where we all got to ride Goofy's Barnstormer over and over again--from 6:50 to 7:00 pm, I think we rode 5 or 6 times! But we weren't going to leave a moment before we had to! Ended up going back the next day for another MK filled day to see all the things we missed the first day, plus re-visit some favorites.
Best new attraction is Buzz Lightyear's ride--no matter where I was in MK, I kept hearing kids say "I want to go on BL again!" Cinderella's Surprise Celebration was a good opportunity to see all the characters--from a distance. But the guide map said there was a character meet and greet after the show, and I didn't see any meeting and greeting going on. As a matter of fact, this was the one big disappointment of MK--virtually no character sightings! Friar Tuck was at the entrance when we first came in. Of course, we saw Mickey at his house in Toontown. And we stood in line for 35 minutes (grrrr--but had to do it...) to meet Ariel in her grotto. And that's it--over two days! We got 15 character autographs in total from our 4 days--about half from the Character Caravan, and the remainder mostly from AK or MGM.
Which leads me to my final bit of news--the Character Caravan. The CC was at AKL on Sunday and Tuesday. It's advertised as running from 7:30-9:00, but that's not really the case. What happened at AKL was that they sent 4 characters out from 8:10-8:40, then the same 4 characters came back for another half and hour at 9:10. On Sunday, we had Baloo, King Louis, Rafiki and Timon. On Tuesday, we had the Queen of Hearts, White Rabbit, and Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. The couldn't tell us in advance what characters were going to be there, only that they didn't send the same ones all the time. So--before you head to your hotel lobby at 7:30 to see characters (like we did!), check with your front desk to get the real scoop on what's going to be happening.
Had a great time--wish we had another day or two so we could spend more time at Epcot and go back to AK. With shorter hours, couldn't take a break in the middle of the day to go back to the hotel, but DD3 managed to catch a few winks in the stroller, so it wasn't too bad. She didn't end up having any huge meltdown until we boarded the plane to go home! And it was mercifully brief!
So--that's my report off the top of my head--feel free to ask questions!
