Trip Report Another Holiday, Trip Report - Dec 2018

Hello Friends!

It was about 3 months ago when I started my last trip report, which was our Alaskan Cruise trip on the Disney Wonder. Our last trip to WDW was exactly a year ago, so it has been a while (by our standards) since our last visit there.

Right now, we are only a few hours away from taking off to the Most Magical Place on Earth. A lot has happened since we were last there, the biggest one of which is, of course, the opening of Toy Story Land. Yup, we have Fast Passes for Slinky Dog! We also have Fast Passes for Flight of Passage, Mine Train, etc.. etc. So we will be on all the E-Ticket rides. We also have Fast Passes for Illuminations, since this will probably be the last time we will be seeing my most favorite nighttime show in all of WDW. It will probably be an emotional goodbye, I'm sure.

Tomorrow, we will be doing the Wanyama Safari for the 2nd time. The last time we did this was back in 2013. Back then, only guests staying at AKL got a chance to do this. We haven't done it again since, but that will change with this trip. So we are looking forward it. Later in the trip, we will do a "Sleigh Ride" at Fort Wilderness. It will be a fun way to look at all the holiday decorations that Disney guests staying there have put up. And of course, we will be attending a MVMCP. I wonder how many ginger molasses cookies I can consume in one evening?

As usual, Donald is all dressed in his elfs outfit, ready to go.
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I will try to report live as much as I can from there. But right now, I need to go around the house to make sure I haven't forgotten anything! We leave for the airport in an hour!

Zz.
 
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ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
A final good morning from the Most Magical Place on Earth. This is our last full day here. We leave for the airport bright and early tomorrow morning. Can't believe our 9-day trip is about to end! :(

Today we will do DAK. Have fast passes to EE, Up bird adventure, and FoP. Yes two FoP fast passes in a single trip. What can I say? :)

We don't have plans yet on what we'll do the rest of the day after we are done with all our fast passes. We'll decide on the fly what we want to do.

Not looking forward to flying back into wintery-cold Chicago tomorrow, not after the weather we have had here for the past few days.

Zz.
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We stopped by DS to get last minute stuff, and have now left WDW. My shoes and socks are wet, and I needed to get outta them. So we are in our room, resting and drying out.

It has been a great trip, even with the rain on our last day. I will have more to report on ,and possibly more photos and videos.

Zz.
 
MinnieM123

MinnieM123

Premium Member
Wow, 9 days sure did fly by! Glad you enjoyed your vacation, and have a safe trip home tomorrow.

By the way, you mentioned you were in the queue for EE in the rain. I thought they didn't run EE in the rain--were you actually able to ride it in the rain?
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
MinnieM123 said:
Wow, 9 days sure did fly by! Glad you enjoyed your vacation, and have a safe trip home tomorrow.

By the way, you mentioned you were in the queue for EE in the rain. I thought they didn't run EE in the rain--were you actually able to ride it in the rain?
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Yup. We rode it in the rain. It wasn’t that heavy yet at that time, but the rain still felt like darts hitting your face during the ride.

Zz.
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We are back home, tired, but happy. Each of our luggage barely made it under the 50 lbs limit on Southwest. Yikes! (I went there with a 34-lb luggage.) So yes, we brought back a lot of stuff.

Lots of things to sort out, and I have to transfer all my photos and videos. I'll have more to report on here after I recover. I always say that I often need a vacation to recover from my vacation.

Zz.
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I intended to continue posting stuff from this trip report after I got home, but real life and obligations got in the way. So I'm a bit behind. But as they say, better late than never.....

The highlight of our first full day at WDW was the Wanyama Safari at AKL. We've done this once before, so we knew what to expect. But it was still an amazing outing, something we will definitely do again. Just the family meal at Jiko at the end was worth it.

Here was the special truck that will take us on our safari.
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It was definitely newer and more comfortable than the one we rode a few years ago.

And off we went! We had animal keepers on the truck with us, and the first one was worked directly at the savanna surrounding Kidani Village. So she had intimate knowledge of the animals there.
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And we're off, as we head "backstage" and toward the entrance of the first savanna.
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And we're in!!
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cont....
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
... cont.

It didn't take very long or far for us to start seeing these beautiful animals, a few of them even coming right next to the fence.

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We continued on our way toward the first gate leading us into the savanna. We get to see Kidani Village from the point of view of the animal inhabitants.
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Our first entrance into the savanna.
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We were in! There were no more fences separating us from the animals. Throughout all of this, our guide continued to give us amazing info and facts about the animals that we were seeing and how they were cared for.
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cont.....
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
... cont.

We continued on. Many of us were admiring not just the close encounter with the animals, but also the beauty of the resort. AKL has always been my most favorite resort in all of WDW, and not just because two of my most favorite restaurants in all of WDW, Jiko and Boma, are there! :)

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And yes, there roads were bumpy and the truck shook and rolled quite a bit in places, as you can see by this blurry photo.
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But they also stopped many times during the safari, especially when we got chances to look very closely at a few of the animals.
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cont....
 
ZapperZ

ZapperZ

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
... cont.

We had a chance to see a lot of the inhabitants of the savanna, but there were plenty of giraffes, and they got a lot of our attention.

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We had to go through a number of gates during the excursion, because each of the 4 savanna at AKL are isolated from one another. I believe here we were about to go into the savanna surrounding Jambo House.
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We got to see these adorable guys. They used to run free when we saw them several years ago (see the video that I did in my earlier Wanyama Safari report). Here, one of the keepers (our driver, actually), fed them so that we can get a better look.
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cont.
 

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