[LSUtigerfan]

Day 4 at Animal Kingdom and dinner at Boma!

6:27 am...ring...ring...Reach over for the speakerphone button, Yeah! It's the Mouse calling again! Ok, so it was only about 30 seconds of excitement, then I realized it was time to get up. Dh & I rolled out of bed and I could see the an orange glow peeking through the crack of our drapes. I opened them to reveal a beautiful sunrise. The beauty of this resort is really amazing. The view across Lago Dorado (the lake) never gets old. And I really like how there are 3 different styles of buildings to choose from, I think it also adds to the uniqueness of the resorts grounds. The azaleas were blooming and so were these beautiful trees, I can't remember the name of them, but they had the most vibrant yellow flowers that covered their branches, and the ground beneath. By the way things were looking, this was going to be a great day for the animals and our family!

I called MIL & FIL next door to wake them ( I should've pretended I was Mickey! ). Shortly thereafter, I heard a knock on our connecting door, they were going to be sleeping in today. She could hardly hold her eyes open. Dh & I decided that was fine, we would have a partial day to ourselves. We got dressed then woke the girls. This was a morning when we had to bathe them, because they fell asleep on the LONG busride "home" last night. We are usually morning bathers anyway, but at WDW it really helps to complete this chore at night, not to mention to wash the germ [img]graemlins/achoo.gif[/img] , sweat & sunscreen layers off of their bodies! We ate pop tarts & honey buns in the room again this morning. Boy, am I glad I sent myself that box full of goodies! Eating a light snack in the room really helped us to get to the parks faster, and enabled us to eat an early lunch and beat the 12:00 crowds ! Of course dh did go down to Pepper Market for a fresh fruit cup & milk for Grumpette!

We walked to our bus stop and were on our way within 5 minutes [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] ...loving these buses!
This morning the bus was about 1/3 full when we got on. We are at stop #4, but it stops at stop #1 last for pickups. After we stopped at bus stop #1, our bus was at least half full (the most crowded I've ever seen it). So if you ever stay at CSR during a really crowded time, don't get on at bus stop #1 if you don't have to, if you want to be seated for the ride. (So, Maggie, I would say that 8B is the best choice for buildings (MAYBE a 5 min. walk to El Centro).

We arrive at AK within 5 minutes, CSR is really a lot closer to AK than I thought. On our ride over to AK, our driver ranted & raved over Boma. He said it was the best food at WDW! Yeah, we'll be there tonight! [img]graemlins/yuma.gif[/img] He also said his 2nd choice for dining was Le Cellier; then he said "whatever you do, don't eat the food in China, it's terrible." Oh well, my family made me eat there, I'll have Moroccan next time.

Dh & I were really excited to see a park we've never been to before. We walked to the entrance and it was so lush with greenery. We arrived at EE time and a lot of other people were pouring out of buses. We quickly made our way back to Kilimanjaro Safari, walking so fast we barely had a chance to soak in our environment. We did stop, in awe I must say, in front of the Tree of Life...it is breathtakingly beautiful. Dh turns to me and says "I'm going to love this park." Our dd's are just looking around at everything. Princess Face was walking and Grumpette was in her comfy stroller. Princess Face liked to walk and would have no problem telling us when she wanted to rent a stroller...although, I could usually tell before the announcement came [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] .

There were no waits for Kili. Safari, and no FP's available so we went right on the ride. *Tip: Stay in the right hand line for easier stroller drop off. The CM suggested we sit in the back row for better photo ops, which proved to be true. This also made the family behind us happy, as they wanted the front row! This was a very bumpy ride... hold on to your babies!!! I caught lots of air time on this ride, but it was lots of fun. Princess Face had her disposable camera snapping like crazy on this ride. Dh was taking plenty himself. We got our pics back yesterday & half of them were blurry from movement (only used 400 speed film). *Tip: Don't worry about taking pictures, haven't we all seen animals before? Sit back and really enjoy the ride, it's beautiful and relaxing. Both dd's liked this ride, but Grumpette didn't care for the air time very much. My favorite thing was seeing the cutest baby hippo splashing his mouth in the water! (Can everybody say, "Awww!").

We headed back to the front of the park at a more leisurely pace, stopping at all of the booths/shops, and soaking in the building architecture. Love this park. I purchased myself a pin lanyard, since I was robbed at Millionaire yesterday! Then Grumpette wanted an elephant beanie that makes a trumpeting sound when you squeeze it (really cute). We try several hats on her...the sun was beaming today & the temp was rapidly climbing. She wanted nothing to do with them [img]images/icons/mad.gif[/img] . Princess Face spots a large Nala that she just had to have , we gave in only because she agreed to package delivery to our resort, then we proceeded to add 2 shirts, a hat (and something else I can't recall) to the delivery and , of course $110 bill. Oh, well we are on vacation, and we did give up a 5th b-day party for our dd to come to WDW! Now we decide to mosey around the park. ITTBAB 3-D show has a 5 min. wait (no FP's available yet) so in we go!

Stading in line for this show isn't bad at all. The view of the Tree of Life is stunning. We spotted all sorts of intricate carvings everywhere we looked. I began to prepare Princess Face for this show, she informed me that she was not scared and know it was "all pretend." (She says pretend like, pree-tend, it's so cute [img]graemlins/blush.gif[/img] ). Grumpette fell asleep in her Baby Bjorn carrier, so I didn't have to worry about her. I swear, she will sleep anywhere, mouth open, drooling and all. More about drool later tonight...more times than one!!! The show was hilarious, we all loved it. Before the show, Princess Face was complaining about the glasses being too big, but that ended as soon as the show began. There were many, many children who left this show crying, some were older than Princess Face. I guess it just depends on the child. If anyone has any questions about it feel free to ask me. This show got a huge thumbs up from our family. We exit to find that we are extremely happy (once again!) that I tied that pink scarf to the stroller handle.

We were walking toward Camp Minnie-Mickey when we saw Lilo & Stitch!!! We love them! So we stand in line ~10 mins. because thaey took a 4 min. break. Once they came back from their break we were only 2nd in line, so they were well rested for us! We approached the characters, pen & book in hand, and thay were really "making over" Princess Face's long blonde ringlets, when I said, "Stitch is being so well behaved today!" Well he proceeded to stick his finger in his nose then into his mouth [img]images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] ! We said Yuck, Stitch! So, of course he did it again. Lilo just shook he head & did that "He's crazy" motion with her hand. We laughed and laughed, and got great pictures and video footage of this. Thanks again to my dh!

Now, we went to DinoLand, it was VERY hot and crowded. My first impression of this section was that it seems to be out of place in this park. I did enjoy this area, but something just wasn't right. I said absolutely not to the play area & we rode Triceratop Spin. Grumpette was clapping & yelling "yeah!" when she saw it. Pricess Face & I liked Aladdin better. I then grabbed a FP for Primeval Whirl (45 min for stand-by). We were all hungry so Pizzafari, here we come.

It was 11:30 now, Pizzafari wasn't crowded at all. Princess Face fell asleep in the comfy stroller since Grumpette was in her Baby Bjorn. We let her sleep, she can eat later. Grumpette & I grab a table in the room all the way in the back, it had awesome murals of African animals all over it. It also had the highest ceilings (I think) which would make it the coolest! Grumpette "neighed" at the zebras and "growled" at all the others on the vibrant walls. Dh brought some really yummy pizza & bread sticks to our table. 3 big thumbs up from us...Shh...remember, one of us was asleep. The marinara sauce was sweet, so I think I ate more of the breadsticks than pizza. *Note: there are no lids or straws for drinks in this park, so bring a sippie cup, unless you want to fork out ~$7 for a souveneir sports bottle type cup thingy (they are cute).

Next, I rode Primeval Whirl (FP) alone, dh doesn't like these kind of rides anyway. Princess Face was still asleep, thank goodness bcause she was too short for this one, & she really wanted to ride it. The ride was alright, I would not wait in line for 45 mins. for this one. I found it wasn't as smooth as it appeared to be...and didn't spin/whirl as much as I would have liked. I rated it a 6.

Off to the Lion King show (no wait). It was superb. The CM's are extremely talented, how do they walk on those stilts? **Note: Watch for these familiar faces in the afternoon parade! Princess Face & lots of other kids got to go down in the middle for the pre-show to sing, dance & do the hand jive. Be sure you listen to that Eric Clapton CD before you go so you can sing along! We all loved this show & Grumpette was applauding & cheering through the whole performance. We were really, really thankful for the pink polka dot scarf once again!!!

I'll be back for the rest of Day 4. Next: More of AK, dinner at Boma! Let the drooling begin! Gotta go get Princess Face.