- Joined
- Mar 9, 2019
Monday February 24, 2020
Animal Kingdom
Today was a morning EMH at AK, but since we were in MK quite late, we weren’t really planning on being there early. I know everyone says to avoid morning EMH if you don’t plan to go early, but this was my parent’s last park day and they had never been to AK... so Animal Kingdom it was!
Our FPor the day were the following:
8:00-9:00 Meet Minnie and Mickey
10:10-11:10 Navi River
11:30-12:30 Kilimanjaro Safari
Other priorities were FotLK, Meet Timon and Rafiki and explore Discovery Island. We were also hoping to see Rivers of Light, but we were not sure the kids would be fine with two late nights... so we were going to go with the flow and see where the day would lead us!
Our objective for the EMH, if we did get there, was to do the Kilimanjaro Safaris before Park opening (we knew we were going to be too late to do anything in Pandora, Everest and Dinosaur were too wild for most of the group, so this was the one thing we were aiming to do.) That way, we would be able to see the 12:00 FotLK show instead of our FP for KS, and go back to the resort for a break.
Having a 2 and a 5 year old means not being able to sleep late anyways, so we woke up around 6:50. We ate a quick breakfast in the room, put on our Lion King clothes (yes, we were that family with thematic shirts today! And we LOVED it!), and were out of the room at 7:25. We were quite satisfied with ourselves until we got to the bus stop... where a HUUUUUUUGE line was waiting for us. Seriously, it seemed like everyone at Pop Century was going to Animal Kingdom that morning! I guess now I will believe everyone who says EMH increase crowds levels!
We watched three buses load, taking FOREVER each time, but thankfully buses were coming quickly, and we got on the 4th bus and were finally on our way. We arrived in front of AK at 8:10, waited for security about 10 minutes and were finally in the park at 8:20.
We power walked to the safari and were in line at 8:24! (That was one moment where I was quite happy to have the strollers!)
There was a posted 20 min wait, but we waited about 10 minutes for a truck to pick us up.
It was the most amazing safari we could have hoped for. The animals were very active, and since the giraffes were walking everywhere, crossing the roads and blocking the cars just long enough, we got to see all the animals very well.
Our guide was amazed at how much the animals were moving! We even got to see the lions walking around and even posing for pictures! It made all the hassle to get to the EMH worth it! (Especially when we realized later on that the wait for KS was in the 3 digits range all day, so even our wait with FP would have been longer than that. Plus, it was a hot day so we were glad we did it first thing in the morning!!!)
Animal Kingdom
Today was a morning EMH at AK, but since we were in MK quite late, we weren’t really planning on being there early. I know everyone says to avoid morning EMH if you don’t plan to go early, but this was my parent’s last park day and they had never been to AK... so Animal Kingdom it was!
Our FPor the day were the following:
8:00-9:00 Meet Minnie and Mickey
10:10-11:10 Navi River
11:30-12:30 Kilimanjaro Safari
Other priorities were FotLK, Meet Timon and Rafiki and explore Discovery Island. We were also hoping to see Rivers of Light, but we were not sure the kids would be fine with two late nights... so we were going to go with the flow and see where the day would lead us!
Our objective for the EMH, if we did get there, was to do the Kilimanjaro Safaris before Park opening (we knew we were going to be too late to do anything in Pandora, Everest and Dinosaur were too wild for most of the group, so this was the one thing we were aiming to do.) That way, we would be able to see the 12:00 FotLK show instead of our FP for KS, and go back to the resort for a break.
Having a 2 and a 5 year old means not being able to sleep late anyways, so we woke up around 6:50. We ate a quick breakfast in the room, put on our Lion King clothes (yes, we were that family with thematic shirts today! And we LOVED it!), and were out of the room at 7:25. We were quite satisfied with ourselves until we got to the bus stop... where a HUUUUUUUGE line was waiting for us. Seriously, it seemed like everyone at Pop Century was going to Animal Kingdom that morning! I guess now I will believe everyone who says EMH increase crowds levels!
We watched three buses load, taking FOREVER each time, but thankfully buses were coming quickly, and we got on the 4th bus and were finally on our way. We arrived in front of AK at 8:10, waited for security about 10 minutes and were finally in the park at 8:20.
We power walked to the safari and were in line at 8:24! (That was one moment where I was quite happy to have the strollers!)
There was a posted 20 min wait, but we waited about 10 minutes for a truck to pick us up.
It was the most amazing safari we could have hoped for. The animals were very active, and since the giraffes were walking everywhere, crossing the roads and blocking the cars just long enough, we got to see all the animals very well.
Our guide was amazed at how much the animals were moving! We even got to see the lions walking around and even posing for pictures! It made all the hassle to get to the EMH worth it! (Especially when we realized later on that the wait for KS was in the 3 digits range all day, so even our wait with FP would have been longer than that. Plus, it was a hot day so we were glad we did it first thing in the morning!!!)