August Trip Report: Disney Day 4

Cast:
Us
Jen
Joe
H - Just turned 2 in June

Our friends
Kelsey
John
J - Turned 2 in March

My parents
John
Mary

This morning we were up early for breakfast. We had arranged for cabs to pick us up so that we would make it on time (as the dining reservation bus was making their pick up at AKL at 6:45 and we had no need to be on the bus that early for our 8:15 reservations). They were late, and unorganized...and okay, so they didn't really send anyone specifically to pick us up despite calling to arrange it, and we ended up taking two of the taxis that happened to be there waiting for calls that morning, and we ended up getting into AK at about 5 after 8:00. A briskish walk had us checking in for breakfast …. at 8:13. But we weren’t late! It actually wasn’t too busy at breakfast. The part of the room we were in only had a few other tables in it during the time we were there.

I love the Tusker House breakfast and I was definitely looking forward to it. There are unique options (such as the bobotie and the corned beef hash with the corned bread) and familiar options and it is all tasty. The characters were great and H and J both had some great moments with Daisy and Donald.

After breakfast we hopped a safari truck with a brief wait. I love the safari. It is always a different ride because of the animals and it was so much fun to share that with H. He got very excited and pointed out several animals when he saw them. Afterwards, we had fastpasses for Festival of the Lion King. I have seen this before and absolutely love it, but I was the only one of our group who had. It was fun getting to share a first with the rest of the group. They were all equally impressed, and it was great watching H’s face during the Tumble Monkeys’ routine.

H was excited for another train ride on our way to Conservation Station, seeking out Gi-Tar Dan. While we were watching YouTube videos to familiarize H with Disney World, a video of Gi-Tar Dan autoplayed. H *loved* the video and once we were at Disney World, he started saying something I couldn’t interpret. One morning it occurred to me and I asked “Are you saying Gi-Tar Dan?” and he lit up and said “Yeah! Gi-Tar Dan! See Gi-Tar Dan?” I had grabbed a times guide when we got to the park that morning, so I knew we were going to make it during one of Gi-Tar Dan’s performance times. As soon as we got to Rafiki’s Planet Watch we saw him over near Chip and Dale. There was a poor baby squirrel running back and forth across the path nearby and people were trying to interact with it. Gi-Tar Dan was encouraging them to leave it be (it crawled up onto Joe’s shoe and he lifted his foot to set it back down off the sidewalk, trying to encourage it to make it's way back into the trees...it came back and crawled up onto his foot again a few minutes later...it eventually ran off and stayed off the path).

My mother got Gi-Tar Dan’s attention and mentioned that H had been looking forward to seeing him. Gi-Tar Dan sang H a song especially for him while H danced and clapped and jumped around. It was a definite magical moment. I can’t begin to describe how awesome it was. We’ve been home for a few days now, and Henry frequently plays with his toy guitar (or anything he can hold up like a guitar) and says he’s Gi-Tar Dan or asks one of us to play him the video we took so that he can listen to the song and dance again.

Although that was going to be a hard moment to top, we continued on with our day and H got to meet Chip and Dale and have a few minutes hugging and high fiving them before we went into the building. The kids explored the displays in the building before we head out to the Affection Section. The majority of the animals were in the areas where they could rest, but we were able to say hello to a couple of goats.

After we made our way back to Harambe, Kelsey, John and J decided to head back to the hotel for a break while we decided to stick with our fastpasses for Kali River Rapids. My parents found a table to take a break with H and Joe and I were off. We got there and discovered that Kali was down and they were uncertain how long it would take to be up and running again. They let us know we could hold on to our fastpasses and have them honored at any point during the day after it came back up, or we could choose to use it another fastpass attraction. Since they didn’t seem optimistic about how long it would take to get it up and running, Joe and I decided we’d try Everest. After stopping by to let my parents know, we head off to Everest...and then immediately head back to my parents when we discovered that Everest was *also* down (something electrical on that side of the park, maybe? I don't know.). We decided to take a walk along the Maharajah Jungle Trek in search of tigers. We found the animals to be few and far between on this walk and we were not able to see any of the tigers.

We were off to Dinoland for a late lunch at Restaurantasaurus. The themeing here is so ridiculous, but I love all the little touches like the exitosaurus signs, etc. We were in a relatively quiet room, and H, who is not a good sleeper and definitely not one of those kids who just falls asleep while playing, put his head down on the table. Joe asked him if he wanted to lay down in his stroller and he was *out*. We left H sleeping with his Grammie and Granpa, who were enjoying taking a break, and Joe and I took off for the past and a near miss with an asteroid since there was only a 10 minute wait (I was happy with the My Disney Experience app and being able to check wait times for things nearby).

After meeting back up with my parents and H, we returned to the safari for our last fastpass of the day. We had a great ride with some awesome animal sightings. The male lion was sitting up, we saw the cheetah, and lots of giraffe. We took a walk on the Pagani Forest Trail after the safari and had some incredible sights. The underwater hippo area offered us a great view of the hippo walking/gliding around under water. I got a great snippet of video. We also got to see two baby gorillas and their mamas, which H loved!

As we walked back into Harambe, thunder was rumbling and the skies were getting rapidly greyer. We took a bathroom break and came out to an all out downpour that just kept getting worse and worse. We waited under the awning for a bit to see if it would let up at all (Joe entertained H by running him out into the rain and back under the awning every so often). We had plans for Fantasmic that evening, and had planned to leave AK and head straight for DHS...with the rain not letting up, even with ponchos or umbrellas we were going to be soaked by the time we got to the busses. We decided we’d head for the busses and make our decision when we got there which bus we were getting on, the one to DHS or the one back to the hotel to change out of our wet clothes. The increasingly bright lightning and the increasingly loud (and close) thunder made the choice for us. Just as we got to the bus stop and were treated to a very bright very loud burst. We head to the hotel to change, still thinking there was the potential that we would try to get back out to DHS for the show, especially since the rain was starting to let up.

Once we got back to the hotel and changed, the it was still rainy and the lightning was still flashy, so we decided we didn’t really want to spend the evening sitting on the open, metal stadium seating at Fantasmic. A quiet evening hanging out in John, Kelsey and J’s room watching movies and chatting and a late dinner at Mara (the African Stew was *delicious*) were a nice way to wrap up the day.

Next up: Epcot