Charlotte's First Very Merry trip to WDW (Dec 2017) Day 3 - Animal Kingdom, Pandora & Pool Time

[vics18]

Index is here

Sunday 3rd December

Hello, hello! Welcome back. Today was a really lovely day, but a bit difficult to write because I had to go back in time to explain some things! So imagine the Back to the Future theme music playing in your mind and let’s begin!

I woke at 4 AGAIN! Seriously?! Anyway, I used the stupidly early hour to jump on the Disney app and managed to get an breakfast ADR for us at Tusker House on the 9th, which was our other Animal Kingdom day. Pretty chuffed with this I did a bit of whatsapping and checking of Instagram and Twitter. Soon Martin and Charlotte woke at around 5:45. Our morning was spent in the usual way – checking out the animals who were outside, showers, breakfast, getting dressed. Here’s a picture or 2 to break up this yawnfest!

Martin made the executive decision that we would get the bus today by leaving the car keys in the room! We only realised when we reached the lobby and neither of us could be bothered to go back for them – bus it was! Me and Charlotte sat in the kids area for a few minutes while he went to fill the cups.

Could she get any closer?

When he got back to the lobby he asked at the concierge desk about the free golf transportation. They told him he would have to leave around an hour and a half before his tee time, and as this was quite early in the morning he decided he would just drive. I think the only reason he was thinking of using the transport was so he could leave us the car. However, although I have driven and will drive in America, I was looking forward to spending his golf morning hanging out and doing some exploring of the resort with Lottie.


Anyway, back to today! We went through Zawadi Marketplace to the bus stop, mainly because I wanted to look at the AKL T shirts but there were none I really liked.


Once at the bus stop, it looked pretty grim. The stops were all quite full and a Disney Springs bus was just pulling away with 2 people on it! We waited, and waited. Another bus arrived… another Disney Springs one! What the heck?! Obviously there was nobody at the stop as one had just left, but also – don’t the shops open a bit later at DS? Why was anyone going there at 8:30am?! Not too long after this bus pulled away empty, 2 Animal Kingdom buses turned up. People surged forwards to get on it, but it was pretty full so we hung back and got on the one behind it. I managed to get a seat and had Lottie on my lap, but Martin had to stand with the stroller. The trip to AK was super short and we were soon pulling up in the bus station.
As I picked Charlotte up I noticed that there had been a slight nappy situation! I won’t elaborate on that in case anyone is eating, but we needed our first stop to be a restroom!

I had a spare set of clothes for her in my bag all the time just in case, so it was no problem really. I changed her, popped new leggings on and she was sorted in no time at all. We found Martin outside and put her back in the stroller, she was soon asleep in her stroller, again managing to miss the entrance to the park and seeing the tree of life.

We decided to take a stroll round to Everest as I had never done it! I know right – call myself a Disney fan?! So I was super excited to go on today, and thought it was good timing to do it while she was asleep. This area of the park is so beautiful.

The single rider line was showing 10 minutes so I left Martin with all my stuff and joined the line! That wait time was pretty accurate and I got called to sit with a lady whose husband and little boy were in front of us. Straight away she said “I’ve never been on this and I’m really scared, have you?” Haha, I confessed I had never ridden either. I absolutely loved this ride! It’s my brother and sister in law’s favourite Disney ride and they had made me promise I wouldn’t miss it this trip.

We sent him this pic when I came off, as sadly the ride photo never arrived in our account . I wanted to do it again but unfortunately didn’t get chance on this trip.


Our first Fastpass today was to meet “Disney Pals” at the Character Outpost. We took a slow stroll over there, spotting Baloo and King Louie going on their break on the way.

Lottie was still asleep when we arrived so we sat on a table opposite to give her a bit more sleep. Eventually we woke her up gently as we were coming to the end of our FP window. We let her sit for a little minute to come to, then headed in! I didn’t know what characters would be in here, as we were coming to the end of the small queue, Martin peeked around and said “It’s Mickey and Minnie together” Yay! The dream! Even better when we got in there they were wearing the cutest festive outfits! Once again, Charlotte was happy to see her new BFFs and today I managed to remember her autograph book! Yes! We are finally winning at character meets...

... Then got outside and realised the PP photographer hadn’t scanned either of our bands. Noooo! We thought we were doing so well! I took a screenshot of the time so that hopefully we could go to the photo centre again and find them (this was becoming a habit – if you ever need to know where these places are, we have become quite the experts.)
Spoiler – we found them!
Pictures…..

As we were strapping Lottie back into her stroller I got a Whatsapp from Jo Harding to say they were just on their way into the park. So…this is where we have to go back in time!

To cut an extremely long story short, we had all been chatting in the lead up to this trip – although mainly me and Jo haha. One of our (many) topics of conversation was the things we wanted to buy while we were out here. We had both seen the festive Dooney & Bourke that was being released, and also one with the Disney dogs on. Now, I have never bought a Dooney before. They are so expensive and I have never loved one enough to be able to justify it to myself. However…I really, really loved both of these bags. Plus it was my birthday soon, and Christmas coming up so I felt a little bit less guilty spending all that money on myself! As I’m sure you all know if you’ve read Brett and Jo’s TRs (and if not, go and read them, they’re much better than mine!) you’ll know Jo is partial to a Dooney, and when we were chatting about these bags she said she thought they would be likely to sell out very quickly – ie before I arrived. Very, very kindly she said they would pick them up for me. Turns out it wasn’t as easy as they thought it would be to do this, which you can read about in their TR. I was in work the Monday before we flew, and got a message from Jo to say she had found some of the christmas bags in a random store in Hollywood studios and did I still want one! We had thought they were sold out everywhere so I couldn't believe it! I quickly messaged her back and said yes please, and how big was the smaller of the two (Brett was skitting me for this, apparently the bags were being bought up left right and centre while I was asking questions, but when you're going to spend over $200 on a bag you want to know you're getting the right one!) We agreed on a size and Jo said she'd pick me.a nice one. About half an hour laterI got another message to say they had found the dog Dooneys in another store! I couldn't believe it, talk about lucky - they had completely sold out when they were released the day before at Disney Springs . Once again we agreed on a size (this time was easier as they only had the 2 smaller ones) and Jo asked which dogs I liked so she could pick me a good bag (it's all about the placement!) So just like that we both had the bags we had wanted for so long and thought we wouldn't get.
A fee days later, on our travel day I woke up to a message to say they had also managed to get us one of the Pluto popcorn buckets which were sold out everywhere! So as you can see we (mainly me) had a lot to thank them for.


So back to now, we had discovered we both planned to come to AK today and planned to meet and I could get my swag! They had gone up to the Dawa bar to get a drink, so we walked up there and Martin spotted Jo outside with Marceline while Brett was in the bar getting them drinks (margaritas I think!) Me and Jo hugged and said hi. It was a very strange feeling finally meeting, we had been chatting for so long it felt like I already knew her! We were gabbing away when Brett turned up with their drinks, so it was more hugs and hellos. We introduced Marceline and Charlotte, who had a rummage in my bag and found some crayons and colouring books to occupy them while the adults chatted!

Saying hi!

Jo gave me the bags and Pluto and I thanked her profusely. It really was very nice of her (and Brett) to get these and I was very grateful. Martin nipped into Dawa bar and got me a Tahiti Punch (Snow Leopard Vodka and watermelon lemonade) and himself a Safari Amber. He had to pay cash as the magic band reader was down – luckily we’d brought some! I loved my drink – slipped down a bit too easily considering it was about 11:45am! Martin said his beer was lovely too. We had a really nice time chatting away and the girls playing. All too soon the drinks were gone and we both had ADRs to get to, so we took a selfie and said our goodbyes for now!

Photo c/o Brett!

We were meeting up again on Tuesday evening to do Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party together, along with Brett and Jo’s friends Jon and Lisa, and their little girl Ceci.


Our ADR was at Yak & Yeti so we made our way back into the Asia area (crossing paths with Baloo and King Louie on the walkway again!) We waited in the lobby for about 10 minutes before being seated upstairs. Our lovely server was called Stef and she was very taken with Lottie! She gave us the usual menu and a specials menu, I picked the honey chicken and Martin had Korean fried chicken and waffles from the special menu.

Martin very much won this food battle – his food was gorgeous I was very jealous! There was nothing wrong with the honey chicken, it was just a bit bland. We both had soft drinks as they are included with the TS meal, and I also got a sangria which was lovely but there was WAY too much ice in it. I took this opportunity to have a look at my goodies from the Hardings!

I love my bags so much!

Charlotte was being a bit of a grouch during this meal, she was getting tired and didn’t really want to eat much. She had a tiny bit of Martin’s and I gave her a banana and some breadsticks from my bag too.

I don’t think we got dessert as I haven’t noted any details and there are no pictures (pictures or it didn’t happen).
We wanted to go to the Flights of Wonder show now, as it was the last showing that we could do today and I thought Lottie would enjoy it as she is obsessed with animals and birds! We were cutting it a bit fine to make it, and were still a bit unsure about the whole dining plan credit/tip/charging thing, being DDP newbies. We left cash for the sangria and tip but wrote out the tip amount on the receipt as well so ended up having the sangria and 20% tip charged to our room as well! I know, amateurs!


We left the stroller outside Y&Y and made the short walk to the Flights of Wonder show (passing Baloo and King Louie AGAIN! Do they actually meet anywhere or just walk around Animal Kingdom?!)

We found a seat near to the back with nobody in front of us which was good as it was easier for Lottie to see.

She enjoyed the parts of the show where she could see/hear the birds, and was amazed when they flew over us, but the talky parts lost her a bit and she took the time to chill and recharge her batteries.

Once it was over (and really over as it’s closed now!) we went back to get the stroller and she was soon fast asleep again. We had to sacrifice a safari fastpass here as she really needed a nap.


Next up – Pandora! We walked over to it via Dinoland. I really hate this bit of the park!

As we were almost at the bridge to cross to Pandora we bumped into the Hardings again, who had just got done with their lunch. We discussed food (they won the food contest!) and parted ways again.


We headed over the bridge into Pandora. I have seen Avatar, didn’t really like it that much although it is a very pretty film. Didn’t know what I would make of Pandora really but it is beautiful, and very well done.

It wasn’t as busy as I thought it would be, although we soon found out that’s because everybody in there is in the queues for the 2 rides! We walked down to the right as you enter and found a little area where you could sit (they were just flat rocks but we’re not fussy!) and there was a drinks cart so we got a cold sprite and had a lovely 5 minutes, sitting together and watching the world pass by.

Eventually we decided to make a move as our fastpass was now open for Flight of Passage. I went first and Martin said he would have a little look round then wait for me at the shop exit. I walked straight through the FP queue and got sent into my own line as a single rider. Don’t want to say too much about this ride in case you want to avoid spoilers, so I will just say that I thought it was fantastic! Jo had mentioned that as a single rider she was sat in seat 16 which is the last in the row so she was at the edge of the screen, but I got luckier and was seat 8 which was right in the middle.
The standby queue was 195 mins when I joined the FP queue, and although I am not in a position to be able to wait for something that long these days, I think I probably would feel the ride was worth it if I had. The only problem I had was that the 3D goggles were really big on me so I had to hold them on with one hand! Not sure why, there were kids in the same ride room as me who didn’t seem to have the same problem and I don’t think my head is particularly tiny! I should have tried them on sooner and asked for different ones – will do that next time for sure! The ride vehicle was also much comfier than I was expecting, was worried it might feel a little claustrophobic but it wasn’t at all for me.

It took ages to walk through the building and you exit into the shop (naturally!) When I found Martin, Charlotte was awake and turned out I had been gone about 40 minutes! Considering I hadn’t waited in any queues it just shows you how long it takes to actually experience this ride, with the size of the building actually walking through it takes a good while, then the pre ride shows and the ride itself!

I forgot yesterday that I had to try and explain the whole Instagram #disneywall thing to Martin when we saw some hilariously “posey” pictures being taken in front of the bubblegum wall when we came out of Spaceship Earth.

#mosswall

Anyway, I told Martin how much I’d enjoyed FoP and we went to the queue to ask for rider swap so he could go next. Once he was on his way in, me and Charlotte went for a little look at the rest of Pandora.

Pandora snacking

I video called my brother and sister in law to show them around but had to stop when some drumming started up and I couldn’t hear them any more! My brother was very amused about this.

We watched the drumming show which was great.

They got some kids up to drum along with them, one little boy was loving it so much he didn’t want to go back to his mum at the end of the interactive bit so she had to go and retrieve him.. I noticed she had a baby in a carrier on her back who was eating an ice lolly and melting it all over himself, the carrier and her back! That would have been a very sticky situation once she figured out what was going on!
Once the show was over we went back to the shop to see if Martin was there yet. He wasn’t so we had a little mooch round inside.

Charlotte enjoyed this banshee

We didn’t see anything we wanted enough to buy though. When we went back out Martin was there, and he really liked the ride too. Because we did rider swap we had a pass we could use for it another day.

Although there was loads we hadn’t done at Animal Kingdom, our last couple of days had been busy and pretty long so we decided to call it a day now and go back to the hotel for a bit of a rest and a swim!

Saw this guy on the way out!

Obviously we had to go via the camera centre and luckily the lady was able to find the pictures from our meeting with Mickey and Minnie (as you saw above!)

On the way out I managed to get a picture of the beautiful Christmas tree. This morning the sun was right behind it so it was impossible to get a good photo.

We had a very short wait for a bus to come and there was a small queue of people in front of us. A couple of ECVs turned up as the bus did, so obviously they loaded them first and their very large families (as in number of them, not appearance!) We got on and someone stood up to let me sit down with Lottie on my lap, and Martin stood with the stroller.


Incidentally, I was a bit surprised how much of the back of Pandora you can see from the road into and out of AK. The show buildings particularly, and the floating islands. I suppose over time as the trees grow it will be less visible. Think you just get used to the theming being so impeccable at Disney that things like that are a bit jarring.


Back at the hotel I realised I hadn’t packed any swim nappies for Charlotte so we called into Zawadi and had to pay $2.99 for 2 nappies! We also got some Goofy candies using a snack credit. The CM at the till was so lovely and we were chatting with her for ages. She was very interested in the Royal family. Sadly we are not, so couldn’t really answer her questions! She was saying that cast members get to go to the events at Wide World of Sports for free and she was gutted she didn’t go to see any of the Invictus Games when it was held there as she has a soft spot for Prince Harry!

Making our way back to the room, we got ready quickly and headed back down to the pool. I t was really quiet and we spent a really pleasant hour splashing around in the pool as the sun started to go down.

Pool spam...

At some point a lifeguard jumped in to get a little boy from the deep end of the pool!



Time was marching on so we decided it was best to get dry and get something to eat now. Lottie wasn’t best pleased about getting out, but was OK once we told her it was time to get dinner! Haha! She is totally ruled by her stomach! We got dry and popped the towels in the used towel bin, then went into Mara. We got a Braai chicken flatbread (Oak fired chicken, sun dried tomato pesto, bacon, red onion, cheddar and dal saag ranch) and a BLT hotdog to share with a couple of bottles of pop for Martin to take to golf I think. We asked for them to take out and went back to the room to eat them.

Living the dream

The food was all really nice and we had strawberries for dessert. We gave Lottie a bath and she had her milk and a story before bed. Once she was asleep, we finally got round to opening the bottle of champagne Beth had delivered for us, but we had been too knackered to drink at night until now! Once we polished that off we watched a bit of TV and were asleep by 9! Hard core.

Thanks once again if you made it to the end! We really felt like we found our feet today, had a great time in Animal Kingdom, no toddler tantrums and it was, of course, lovely to finally meet the Hardings. Tomorrow there is lots of Star Wars fun at Hollywood Studios, then a little bit more shopping!
Day 4 - Hollywood Studios, Warm Hugs & Shopping

[Jannyjan]

Glad the day went so well. Love the pic of Lottie on your bed

[EJSakaAnna]

That festive Dooney & Bourke is amazing! Love love love . You’ll be able to use that every Christmas forever, definitely a good purchase!

Sounds like a brilliant day finally riding Everest & Flight of passage too xx

[princess allie]

Loving your trip report and little Lottie is so adorable x

[Minnie Mum]

Lottie is so cute! Love your donney bag with dogs on🐶 enjoying reading along😊

[Palm trees]

This reads like another fabulous day. We were there last Christmas and I remember being awed by the gorgeous trees, the AK one was my favourite.

Edit: it was Christmas 2016 so not actually last Christmas now!

[tory79]

That Christmas d&b Bag is amazing. Do you have any idea if they do them every year?

[clochette]

Glad there were no tantrums today, but you do realise she's saving them all up for one epic tantrum at the most inconvenient moment don't you? (the voice of experience - lol!)

Lottie and Marcelline looked so cute together. Like you, I love the Dooney bags but have never been able to bring myself to spend that much on a mere bag (though I came close last year). Good for you - we all need some spoiling sometimes.

[vics18]

Originally Posted by Jannyjan

Glad the day went so well. Love the pic of Lottie on your bed

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Thank you! Yes I love that one too haha. Thabks for reading x

Originally Posted by EJSakaAnna

That festive Dooney & Bourke is amazing! Love love love . You’ll be able to use that every Christmas forever, definitely a good purchase!


Sounds like a brilliant day finally riding Everest & Flight of passage too xx

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It's beautiful isn't it! Jo managed to get me a great one too with really good placement. Yes that's what I thought, and can pass it onto Lottie one day.
It was a brilliant day! Thanks for reading xx

Originally Posted by princess allie

Loving your trip report and little Lottie is so adorable x

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Thank you so much! X

Originally Posted by Minnie Mum

Lottie is so cute! Love your donney bag with dogs on🐶 enjoying reading along😊

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Thanks so much. Yes it's beautiful I love it! Thanks for reading x

Originally Posted by Palm trees

This reads like another fabulous day. We were there last Christmas and I remember being awed by the gorgeous trees, the AK one was my favourite.

Edit: it was Christmas 2016 so not actually last Christmas now!

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Haha I know what you mean, can't get used to it being 2018 yet either! Seeing all the lovely decorations was one of our favourite parts of the trip. Hope we can go again at Christmas time, it really was magical.

Originally Posted by tory79

That Christmas d&b Bag is amazing. Do you have any idea if they do them every year?

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There was definitely one out the previous year, which was the same pattern but on a cream background. Not sure if there have been others though. Thanks for reading!x

[vics18]

Originally Posted by clochette

Glad there were no tantrums today, but you do realise she's saving them all up for one epic tantrum at the most inconvenient moment don't you? (the voice of experience - lol!)

Lottie and Marcelline looked so cute together. Like you, I love the Dooney bags but have never been able to bring myself to spend that much on a mere bag (though I came close last year). Good for you - we all need some spoiling sometimes.

See more...

Haha, I think the worst tantrums are behind us thankfully!
They do don't they. They were so good playing together nicely.
It's definitely an investment. I got dollars for my birthday to.put towards them so it didn't feel so bad. Problem is, it's a bit of an addiction once you start!
Thanks for reading x