canukulhead
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Mar 11, 2012
- Messages
- 3
Daughter (age 9) and I (Dad) are just back from a week-long, first time, wonderful trip to WDW, staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge (AKL, Mid-February, 2012). This is a mini trip report: some pay-it-forward/pay-it-back for all the good advice we got from this forum prior to going.
The AKL is great: staff are friendly and helpful, the restaurants are good (e.g., Mara) and excellent (e.g., Boma), and our room was very nice. We opted for a pool view (saved $700) and made a special room request (by fax) for an unobstructed view toward the end of the Giraffe trial (not above a restaurant). It was nice to be right next to the pool, which made it easy to zip back and forth between the room and the pool in bathing suits. We had plenty of opportunities to see wildlife too, although we didn’t get to see the baby Okapi, who was still too shy to venture out of the barn (next time!).
We would definitely recommend the AKL: good gift store, story-telling around campfires, great pool and hot tubs, rooms are well appointed, clean, and housekeeping was prompt (though a few more towel animals would have been nice). The themeing is amazingly detailed and very cool, and we didn’t mind the theme-appropriate lighting at all (which strangely seems to be a common complaint).
The Disney transportation system worked very well for us, which may be a reflection of the “slow” time of year we went. Our timing was great: we never waited more than 5 minutes for a bus which took us straight to our destination, the only exception being going from Blizzard beach to downtown for the Cirque (we ended up taking a taxi that time). When we go back to WDW, we’ll try to stay at the AKL again if we can get the discounted rate. The AKL is great!
Dining: We were on the dining plan (DP), which worked well for us. The DP is a bit tricky if you have a kid who eats like an adult. Daughter has a big and adventurous appetite so we did our best to stay away from restaurants with kid’s menus (which are pretty bad, in our view). We thus mostly had buffets for dinner: Boma, Crystal Palace, Biergarten, and Hollywood and Vine. Boma is the best buffet we tried in WDW, in our view, and another good reason to stay at the AKL. We mostly had muffins and fruit for breakfasts, in our room or while waiting for the bus. I liked the dining plan for a few reasons: 1) once paid, you don’t have to worry about the cost; 2) it prompts you to book your reservations in advance (something I probably wouldn’t have done without the dining plan); and 3) It seems to be pretty good value if you eat at the buffets (which are, like all else in WDW, expensive). We paid about $67 per day for the plan and a typical day for use was:
- Breakfast: used free drink mugs for coffee and such and paid cash for fruit and muffins
- Lunch: Sandwhiches, drinks and deserts (e.g., at MK Downtown Bakery would have cost about $30)
- Snack: Ice cream bars (would have cost about $8)
- Dinner: Buffet at Boma (would have cost about $57)
I think we saved about $30 per day on the dining plan, which in itself makes it worth it. For me, the best part about the DP was not worrying about money for food, which is a nice relief from the gratuitous assault on one’s wallet everywhere else. Next time we go we’ll defiantly have a food order delivered to the resort or make a stop on the way to buy bottled water, juice, snacks and food for breakfasts (and avoid paying $3.5 for a muffin).
Parks: Six days of Waahoo!!!! We did all the parks (in order): Magic Kingdom (MK), Animal Kingdom (AK), Epcot, Blizzard Beach (BB) (Typhoon Lagoon was closed), and Hollywood Studios (HS). We also went to Islands of Adventure for a day. We read the Unofficial Guide to WDW with Kids prior to going, which proved to be immensely helpful. Without the book we would have spent a lot of time in lineups, even though it was supposedly a slow time of year. We followed the book’s advice: got to the parks prior to opening, went on the busiest rides first and made clever use of the fastpass.
We made our own “plan of attack” for each park roughly base on guide’s “touring plans”, which I think saved us a lot of time in the lineups (e.g., get to HS early and head straight to Toy Story Mania, get a Fastpass, ride it right away using the regular line, and then return later and use your fastpass to ride it a second time). When we came back later, the regular lineup was 2 hour long. Yikes! I shudder to think what it’s like during the summer months. I’m happy to say we didn’t line up for any ride or show for more than 20 minutes.
When we go again, I think we’ll to go for a little longer, and generally take things a little slower. We did six long and intense days but weren’t able to see even half of it. Next time we’ll try to take at least 8 days and use a couple of our days to go to a park for a second day, perhaps a half day, then head back to the resort to laze about. We didn’t spend as much relaxing time at the resort as we might have. There’s always next time!
(post script: already booked our flights for 10 nights in late August, going to try to stay at AKL again, come on pin-code!)
The AKL is great: staff are friendly and helpful, the restaurants are good (e.g., Mara) and excellent (e.g., Boma), and our room was very nice. We opted for a pool view (saved $700) and made a special room request (by fax) for an unobstructed view toward the end of the Giraffe trial (not above a restaurant). It was nice to be right next to the pool, which made it easy to zip back and forth between the room and the pool in bathing suits. We had plenty of opportunities to see wildlife too, although we didn’t get to see the baby Okapi, who was still too shy to venture out of the barn (next time!).
We would definitely recommend the AKL: good gift store, story-telling around campfires, great pool and hot tubs, rooms are well appointed, clean, and housekeeping was prompt (though a few more towel animals would have been nice). The themeing is amazingly detailed and very cool, and we didn’t mind the theme-appropriate lighting at all (which strangely seems to be a common complaint).
The Disney transportation system worked very well for us, which may be a reflection of the “slow” time of year we went. Our timing was great: we never waited more than 5 minutes for a bus which took us straight to our destination, the only exception being going from Blizzard beach to downtown for the Cirque (we ended up taking a taxi that time). When we go back to WDW, we’ll try to stay at the AKL again if we can get the discounted rate. The AKL is great!
Dining: We were on the dining plan (DP), which worked well for us. The DP is a bit tricky if you have a kid who eats like an adult. Daughter has a big and adventurous appetite so we did our best to stay away from restaurants with kid’s menus (which are pretty bad, in our view). We thus mostly had buffets for dinner: Boma, Crystal Palace, Biergarten, and Hollywood and Vine. Boma is the best buffet we tried in WDW, in our view, and another good reason to stay at the AKL. We mostly had muffins and fruit for breakfasts, in our room or while waiting for the bus. I liked the dining plan for a few reasons: 1) once paid, you don’t have to worry about the cost; 2) it prompts you to book your reservations in advance (something I probably wouldn’t have done without the dining plan); and 3) It seems to be pretty good value if you eat at the buffets (which are, like all else in WDW, expensive). We paid about $67 per day for the plan and a typical day for use was:
- Breakfast: used free drink mugs for coffee and such and paid cash for fruit and muffins
- Lunch: Sandwhiches, drinks and deserts (e.g., at MK Downtown Bakery would have cost about $30)
- Snack: Ice cream bars (would have cost about $8)
- Dinner: Buffet at Boma (would have cost about $57)
I think we saved about $30 per day on the dining plan, which in itself makes it worth it. For me, the best part about the DP was not worrying about money for food, which is a nice relief from the gratuitous assault on one’s wallet everywhere else. Next time we go we’ll defiantly have a food order delivered to the resort or make a stop on the way to buy bottled water, juice, snacks and food for breakfasts (and avoid paying $3.5 for a muffin).
Parks: Six days of Waahoo!!!! We did all the parks (in order): Magic Kingdom (MK), Animal Kingdom (AK), Epcot, Blizzard Beach (BB) (Typhoon Lagoon was closed), and Hollywood Studios (HS). We also went to Islands of Adventure for a day. We read the Unofficial Guide to WDW with Kids prior to going, which proved to be immensely helpful. Without the book we would have spent a lot of time in lineups, even though it was supposedly a slow time of year. We followed the book’s advice: got to the parks prior to opening, went on the busiest rides first and made clever use of the fastpass.
We made our own “plan of attack” for each park roughly base on guide’s “touring plans”, which I think saved us a lot of time in the lineups (e.g., get to HS early and head straight to Toy Story Mania, get a Fastpass, ride it right away using the regular line, and then return later and use your fastpass to ride it a second time). When we came back later, the regular lineup was 2 hour long. Yikes! I shudder to think what it’s like during the summer months. I’m happy to say we didn’t line up for any ride or show for more than 20 minutes.
When we go again, I think we’ll to go for a little longer, and generally take things a little slower. We did six long and intense days but weren’t able to see even half of it. Next time we’ll try to take at least 8 days and use a couple of our days to go to a park for a second day, perhaps a half day, then head back to the resort to laze about. We didn’t spend as much relaxing time at the resort as we might have. There’s always next time!
(post script: already booked our flights for 10 nights in late August, going to try to stay at AKL again, come on pin-code!)
