Animal Kingdom today

We decided to get an early start today so we fixed sandwiches for breakfast and were on the road to Animal Kingdom by 7:15. When we got there we had to spend a few minutes straightening things out; Kassie's ticket wouldn't read correctly, we didn't have the right people on one of our Fast Passes, and Kassie and I both needed to be able to create Fast Passes for each other. When the nice lady at Guest Services fixed all that, we used our first Fast Pass, for Kilimanjaro Safari. Early in the day you see more than when the heat sets in. Today we got to see rhinos, elephants, and for a few moments, the male lion stood tall and proud on top of the rocks before plopping down for a day-long nap.

Next we went to see the Finding Nemo Musical. They do such a good job at bringing animated anamorphic animals to the stage. 

Afterwards Izzy got her face painted in honor of her favorite character, Minnie Mouse. 

Then we were able to meet the stars themselves, Mickey and Minnie, at the New Adventurere Outpost. 

In another part of the park we found some arcade games  Despite the fact that Izzy did very well and should have been the winner, somehow someone else was declared as the winner. 

When someone handed her an extra ticket, dad Jordon took matters into his hands and promptly won her a stuffed toy at the Whac-A-Packycelphalosaur game.

Next to this was the Primeval Whirl so we went on it, and it may be one of my favorite rides at Animal Kingdom. It's just plain fun!

We walked over to see the Pandora area but didn't feel like standing in line for hours for one of those rides. Instead we went to see the Lion King Festival show, which is one of their best. 

We had 3:00 reservations at the Tusker House. They serve a buffet with roasted pork, salmon, curry and roasted chicken, several vegetable salads, chutneys, hummus, and a bunch of other stuff. It was all good, and the dish called Pap, made from ground maize, got a vote of approval from everyone. In the Tusker House some of the Disney stars are around; today Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Donald Duck and Daisy Duck were here. Daisy even asked Izzy to help her lead a parade around the dining room. 

Outside it was getting hotter. Jordan was really overheating, but he still stopped in the sun to study the beautiful carved tree in the center of the park. He found a lot more critters than I did!

Our next stop was, in fact, under this tree - we went to see the "It's Tough to be a Bug"show, with 3-D glasses and smell-a-vision. Afterwards we asked Izzy what she wanted to do, and she immediately headed over to see Mickey and Minnie again. She likes Mickey, but she loves Minnie. And Minnie loves her right back.

Since eventually we had to leave Minnie, we headed out on one of the animal walks, with monitor lizards, giant fruit bats, an aviary, underwater hippos, and gorillas. It was too hot for the tigers to be out; one was tucked way back in the shade, and we didn't blame them a bit. 

So we went on Dinosaur ride, which was better than Randy and I remember it. We walked around a bit, looking for the next thing to do. Izzy joined a street dance with some dinosaur characters I didn't know, then we all decided to get on the Primeval Whirl one more time. And for our last ride of the day, we got on the Triceritops ride.