Trip Report: AKV April 15-23

[Mickeydad]

This was our 2nd stay at Animal Kingdom Villas, but it was the first time we've stayed at Kidani Village. Well, I have to agree with all the posts I read prior to heading down to the resort... it was very laid back, beautiful, and relaxing!!!

I am someone that always creates a detailed schedule for our stays at Disney. But this time... we kindof "winged it!"

We drove down from CT (Me, DW, DD16, DS13, DD4) and stayed in a 1bd Villa Savanna View. The giraffes were outside our porch everyday eating and seemed to be no more than 20-30 feet away! And, having the 2nd full bathroom was great! We had plenty of room.

Prior to the trip, my DW and I decided that we (she) would cook dinners most of the week and just do a dinner or two at a restaurant on property as well. Now mind you, the dinners were meals that took 15-20 minutes to prepare. NOTHING fancy, but family favorites like Nachos, Pasta (we brought our sauce and meatballs!!, and chicken dishes).

We slept in every morning, had big breakfasts in our room, stayed at the pool from 9a-1p and ate our daily dinner around 4p in the room. We would head out to the parks around 5p. We avoided the heat of the daytime and really enjoyed our time in the parks as the sun went down, along with the temperatures.

Because we go to Disney so often, we really don't need to spend more than 2 or 3 hours in the parks. We just planned on doing our favorites, and maybe something new. When we visited Epcot, we made sure we did Captain EO. It was very good, especially since we've never done it before. At Hollywood Studios we did Fantasmic, we hadn't been to the show in over 5 years!. At Magic Kingdom, we did the Haunted Mansion. He did the ride back in November, but with the changes they just made, we did it and enjoyed the upgrades. That sortof keeps things fresh for us.

I don't have a bad thing to say about Kidani at all. Many of the posters on these boards have complained about the "walk" from Kidani Village to Jambo House. Well, no complaining from us. We stayed on the main floor, which is actually the 2nd floor, about a 1 minute walk to the main lobby. Room 7644.

Our walk to Jambo House was about 5 minutes from the Kidani main lobby to Jambo House main lobby. DON'T be discouraged about many of the posts that say the walk is long. All observations are very subjective. Don't take my word for it, or anyone elses. Do it and you make the call.

They have 2 Game Room areas just off the Lobby. One room (Community Hall) is the place to play foosball, pool, PlayStation 2, X-Box, Wii, toys and numerous board games for all ages Community Hall is also the place for arts and crafts activities and the place to go to borrow tennis racquets, basketballs and shuffleboard equipment for use on the sports courts. There is no fee to use the facility or borrow the equipment, unless children are dropped off for Camp Kidani. The other room is a high-tech game room, located across the hall, offers classic to current arcade and video games. My DS and I spent alot of time on the pool table and X-Box.

We truly loved our stay at Kidani Village and will go back!

Anyone have any questions???

Thanks,
Mickeydad

 

[mjc2003]

This is great to hear as we are staying in a GV at Kidani in November, and have never been there. We were originally going to stay for 9 days straight, but decided to split it between AKV and VWL; haven't seen either, so should be fun.

You mentioned doing a dinner or two on site, but don't say if you actually did. Did you eat on site? If so, where? We are coming up on 180 days and I am thinking about a few dinner reservations. If you did any of the restaurants on site were they packed? Did you have a reservation, and did you definitely need it?

As an aside, we have friends heading down tomorrow. Was it really crowded? I know now that we are after Easter break it should be quieting down.

Also, my two girls will be 6 and 3 when we visit. How did you like the pool? It looks really nice in pictures, but sometimes that doesn't tell the story.

Thanks for the info, we are really excited.

 

[Mickeydad]

mjc2003,

We bought food from Sanaa (on site restaurant) and ate in our room the first day we arrived. After driving in from CT, we were tried and eating in our room was the fastest.

We did go in a look at Sanaa Restaurant. This is were our room service food came from that I just told you about. It was crowded, but no major lines. The two nights we ate out were at Cape May and Teppan Edo. We didn't have a reservation for Cape May, we just showed up at 4:30p asked for a table and when they opened at 5p, we got right in!! We love that restaurant, had a craving and that's why we just walked in without a ressie. Teppan Edo is a family favorite too. We did have a ressie for that place. Really good too.

Your daughters will LOVE the pool. Everyone day when they open the big slide the put about a dozen blowup animals on the slide and when the water rushes down for the first time, they come down too and all the kids jump in to get an animal. They are free to keep. One per person, per day! There is also a water park area that is fun for the little ones too. My DD4 loved it!

It was crowded but not very bad. Again, we enjoyed the pool all day until heading to the parks at night. Crowds are a bit lighter, especially for the extra magic hour nights. We've been to Disney during the really busy times, and this didn't seem to be real bad. Don't get me wrong, it was busy, but not overwhelmingly busy (if that makes sense).

Mickeydad

 

[mjc2003]

mjc2003,

We bought food from Sanaa (on site restaurant) and ate in our room the first day we arrived. After driving in from CT, we were tried and eating in our room was the fastest.

We did go in a look at Sanaa Restaurant. This is were our room service food came from that I just told you about. It was crowded, but no major lines. The two nights we ate out were at Cape May and Teppan Edo. We didn't have a reservation for Cape May, we just showed up at 4:30p asked for a table and when they opened at 5p, we got right in!! We love that restaurant, had a craving and that's why we just walked in without a ressie. Teppan Edo is a family favorite too. We did have a ressie for that place. Really good too.

Your daughters will LOVE the pool. Everyone day when they open the big slide the put about a dozen blowup animals on the slide and when the water rushes down for the first time, they come down too and all the kids jump in to get an animal. They are free to keep. One per person, per day! There is also a water park area that is fun for the little ones too. My DD4 loved it!

It was crowded but not very bad. Again, we enjoyed the pool all day until heading to the parks at night. Crowds are a bit lighter, especially for the extra magic hour nights. We've been to Disney during the really busy times, and this didn't seem to be real bad. Don't get me wrong, it was busy, but not overwhelmingly busy (if that makes sense).

Mickeydad

Yes, we love Cape May as well, though my wife gets a bit embarrassed as I devour all the crab legs and end up with butter all over my face. I can't help it...! That's yet another reason why we bought at BCV.
We are very excited to try AKV. Both our girls LOVE to swim, so I suspect we'll have a few pool days the weekend we arrive and wait until the weekdays to hit the parks.
Thanks for the info, it's much appreciated....even if you are a Yankee fan! (I'm a Mets fan, so I guess you could say that one of the reasons I go to Disney is to erase the memories of the Mets!).

We will definitely make a reservation at Teppan Edo, we really enjoy that place. We were lucky to get in last year without a reservation--they told us it would be 2 hours, gave us a buzzer and we waited outside...suddenly 10 minutes later our buzzer went off! Just as we were discussing how we were going to keep the kids entertained for 2 hours. So, we got lucky; this year we'll make a reservation.

 

[Mickeydad]

Hey, my cousins in Oceanside are big Mets fans. I have no ill feelings towards them. In fact, I root for them when they play, except when they play the Yanks!

Enjoy.

Mickeydad