Friday, November 30th
Once again, Mom and I were up early and had a quick breakfast in our room.
This was also the “check out” day for the first half of our booked stay, so there was a printout of the bill slipped under our door. I read over it and spotted something that set off my alarms. There was a $30 charge for “Movies/Entertainment In-Room.” Baffled, I asked Mom if she maybe had watched an on-demand movie while I was doing that time share presentation back on Tuesday, but she said no. Even so, $30 for a movie?! So as soon as I was showered and dressed, I headed down to the front desk to question the bill. They pulled up the account and said that the charge was indeed for an on-demand film—“Little Foot,” to be exact. Baffled, I said that this was hardly the kind of film my Mom would watch. They said that in fact it was only watched for about 2 minutes. $30 for 2 minutes?! The lady said that clearly this was just an accident on my Mom’s party—she was probably just flipping channels—and that they would reverse the charge, which she did.
Life Lesson: ALWAYS read the bill, and ALWAYS question things that don’t make sense. Seriously, $30 for 2 minutes.
The temperature was still cool that morning, but certainly the warmest yet since we’d arrived. We wore just a light single jacket over a t-shirt and were comfortable. We arrived in time to walk right through security at the entrance, and headed straight for the gate for the Africa portion of the park. Because we were only planning to spend the first half of the day in the park, and because we didn’t have a Fastpass for a morning safari, I made the decision that we should skip Flight of Passage this day and instead go straight for the Kilimanjaro Safari to do before the line got long. It was the right decision.
Magic Moment: While waiting for the rope to drop, we struck up a conversation with a retired couple, and they explained how they were Annual Pass holders and came to the parks every day (excluding holidays, weekends, and bad weather) just to get exercise, and how they rode the safari each morning. Now that’s a Life Goal!
As soon as the rope dropped, we moved en masse to the Safari entrance and got in line. The line moved pretty fast, although we did pause just a moment to watch this feeding/training moment between one of the cast members and this crowned crane (not sure if black or grey crowned crane). We learned that they train all the animals daily, in part to keep them busy but also to make it easier if/when they need to be called into shelter quickly due to bad weather, etc.
A lot of animals were on in the morning and we had a grand time. Mom really loved the safari in particular (no surprise), and was genuinely surprised by how close we got to some of the animals.
At one point we had to pause and wait because an ostrich had the right of way on the road.
The giraffes are always a highlight because they tend to be close to the road and aren’t afraid of the trucks. They’re just so impressive and beautiful.
The lions were also being cooperative and up, which was very cool.
The only downside to the safaris is that they’re pushed for time and so rarely pause long enough for you to get good photos. I really wish there was an option for a longer ride. Many of the pics I attempted were either blurred or poorly framed because we were bouncing along, or just too far away to be distinct.
At one point, as we were rolling along, Mom turned to me and, completely deadpan, said, “I had a farm in Africa…” She was quoting “Out of Africa” and I burst out laughing. This picture captured the moment. She looked right at home.
Afterward, we still had time to walk over to the Asia portion of the park to make our first Fastpass (9:05-10:05 am) for Expedition Everest, although we had to walk quickly. It was the first time Mom got a good look at it and she admitted she was a little intimidated by it, but she’s a trooper and we got in line.
It reaffirmed my opinion that it’s one of my top three favorite rides in Disney World, although Mom said she still preferred Big Thunder Mountain more. I do think she missed a lot of the charm of this attraction by only riding once and using the Fastpass—she missed all the details and storyline that you see while in the longer line. Since we were only doing short days, we didn’t have time to return for a second ride. She did enjoy the ride enough to want a T-shirt, but she didn’t find an adult one that she liked enough to purchase (although there was a really cute child’s shirt that we both wanted!).
When we were finished, we started making our way back toward Africa because we only had about 30 minutes before our next Fastpass (10:30-10:45 am) for Festival of the Lion King. So again we didn’t really have time to linger and look at details.
As we were walking, we heard quite a ruckus going on, a lot of loud hooting. We did pause long enough to enjoy the show. You could literally hear them from across the park.
We arrived in time and got a great seat in the third row for Festival of the Lion King. It’s a unique live show that is unlike the famous Broadway show. This is more of a Cirque du Soleil show featuring acrobatics to music from the movie along with one or two other songs (Lion Sleeps Tonight, etc.). It’s an impressive and wonderful show, and IMO the best left show on property, which is saying a lot. I absolutely recommend seeing this!
It was around 11:30 am when we exited the theater, so I thought it was a good time to go find some lunch, before it got real busy. I suggested we do something unique and we headed in the direction of Pandora to eat at Satu'li Canteen. It’s a beautifully themed counter-service restaurant, but the weather was finally warming up enough that we decided to sit outside to eat. We invited shared a young couple and their two little kids to share our large table, and we enjoyed listening to the kids talk about their favorite things in the parks. We ordered and split the following: “Steamed Cheeseburger Pod stuffed with Ground Beef, Ketchup, Mustard, Pickle and Cheddar Cheese served with Vegetable Chips, and crunchy Vegetable Slaw and Boba Balls”, “Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse with Passion Fruit Curd”, and two Pandoran Sunrise (“Refreshing balance of Tropical Juices blended with Powerade® Melon”). It was all very tasty and we were satisfied with things (although I think the balance in the pods was off—it needed a greater proportion of filling to wrapping because it was borderline dry and the flavor was weakened). Those chips, though, were perfect!
By the time we finished eating, it was after Noon. We had a last Fastpass already active for Kali River Rapids, but neither of us was really in the mood to hurry all the way back to the Asia part of the park, or to get soaking wet (it wasn’t THAT warm yet), so we made the decision to just cancel the reservation. I used the app and cancelled it, then looked to see what I could book in its place. The options were extremely limited, but there was a spot in an hour for Dinosaur, so I went ahead and booked it.
This new booking gave us an hour to wander around a little and explore a bit of Pandora in the daytime. Mom admitted that a lot of it was lost on her because she’s never seen the movie, but it’s still a stunning and beautifully designed and landscaped area. She’d seen some of it on TV when it was featured on the View at opening, and she was happy to see it in person to get the real scope of the place. We also did a little shopping along the way, scoping out things we might want to buy later. Mom had told me that she was hoping to find a cool purse of some sort that was safari themed, but no luck.
We walked over to Dinosaur for our Fastpass. Mom’s not really into dinosaurs at all, and I wasn’t impressed with this attraction last time, but we both decided to give it a shot. While it still isn’t a great ride, IMO, it was a little better this time than my first impression. I wouldn’t go out of my way to do it again, though. This ride is super dark (this photo has a bright flash) and things just jump out at you most of the time, like an old school haunted house tour.
We paused in front of the Tree of Life for a couple of pictures. We didn't have time to explore around the tree that day--we had time blocked for the following day to do that.
Magic Moment: While in front of the tree, we caught a very special presentation about parrots. I screwed up with my iPhone during the first portion (thought I was recording but only got a picture), but I did catch the last half. The host was standing in front of this big tree-like perch, and she was talking about how rare some of these birds were, particularly the blue macaw parrot. Sadly, this particular parrot was just declared extinct in the wild this year, but Disney still has a breeding population onsite, and we were about to be treated to a sight that we will not see anywhere else in the world. And suddenly an entire flock of the gorgeous birds swooped in and perched on the stand behind her. She talked for a while about them, and then told us to get ready for when they fly again. It was a very powerful and breathtaking moment that was over too fast.
By this point it was around 2 pm and because we were doing shorter days, we thought this was a good time to head back to our room to relax and give our feet a break. We did take our time working toward the exit, checking out the gift shops a little more and exploring the trails in the “Oasis” area that you pass through. These trails are part of why we both loved this park so much—it’s just gorgeous and immersive. Like that retired couple, I would gladly walk this area every day.
We came across the anteater exhibit and I was able to snap these awesome pics!
We left the park around 2:30 pm and took a Lyft ride back to our hotel. Although the weather had certainly warmed up a bit, it was still a little chilly if not in the sunlight, but we really wanted to try the pool and hot tub because we probably wouldn’t get another chance. We threw on our suits and coverups, and headed outside.
I will give the hotel/time share credit—they have awesome pools, many of them in all sorts of shapes and even a couple of themed ones (a pirate ship, 2 lazy rivers, etc.), plus a really nice cabana bar/restaurant nearby. However, the chilly air kept us from wandering from our own pool. Then we swapped over to the hot tub to ease our aching feet and muscles. That felt really good! At one point I hopped out long enough to buy us something to sip while in the hot tub.
Afterward, we went back upstairs, got dressed, and then debated what to do for dinner. Neither of us felt like leaving the hotel, and the restaurants inside the hotel were very pricey and the acoustics were terribly loud, so we decided to go back outside to the cabana to see what was on the menu. We were pleasantly surprised! The menu was very respectable, and we decided to pick a gourmet burger to split (it was huge and plenty for both of us). They also surprised us by cutting the burger in half and sending the foot out in separate baskets with our own servings of fries (which were excellent!). I wish I’d thought to take a picture—it was all very tasty, and for a reasonable price.
We lingered there for a little while, but it was also a bit loud (several large parties with lots of kids), which we’d had enough of for the day, so we decided to just retire to our room for the rest of the evening. We talked a lot and watched a little TV and then turned in for the nigh, exhausted.