The Roberts Family: Disney Day 4-Animal Kingdom

Our Friday in Florida was spent at Disney's Animal Kingdom. This park was the one park we didn't get to totally see our last visit due to rain so we were really looking forward to seeing everything we missed. We started off our day with a fun 3D show called "It's Tough to be a Bug." We then headed to Dinoland USA,the kids were in LOVE with the Triceratop Spin and went on this ride at least 4 times.This portion of the park is made to look like a old carnival--Auntie Emily and Uncle Jason treated the kids to some carnival games in which both of them won stuffed animals. Ryan spent sometime going on the Triceratop Spin while the rest of us went on a roller coaster called Primeval Whirl. We then headed to a fun ride called Dinosaur. All of us but Ryan and Lydia went on--after we got off, we wandered around waiting for the show Finding Nemo the Musical to start. While most of us were in the bathroom, Jack had an experience with Goofy that not everyone gets to have. At Disney World all of the characters have designated spots where you wait in line to meet them. There are no spontaneous meetings so to say. Jack and Ryan just happened to be in the right spot at the right time when Goofy walked by--Jack was able to pretty much be alone with Goofy and give him a high five with no pressure of a line!! So NICE! We watched Finding Nemo the Musical (which was AWESOME) and then headed for Expedition Everest--a rollarcoaster that was lots of fun but too big for both kids. Ryan and Grandpa stayed back and took Jack and Lydia to check out the monkeys. After that ride we had all decided that we were sick of "fast food" and made our way to a restaurant that we had eaten at the last time we were there--Tusker House. This restaurant was a buffet style and had characters walking around throughout the meal. It is in Africa and the music and atmosphere are so much fun. Jack up until this point had been very blase about meeting characters. BUT, today he had a mickey mouse hat on and Donald Duck was NOT a fan of that! Donald gave Jack a hard time about his hat and there were lots of giggles going around. We got to see Donald, Mickey, Daisey and Goofy at lunch and because it wasn't busy they characters came around multiple times. The next time Jack notice Donald coming around, he carefully took his Mickey hat off and hid it under the table. SO CUTE. Then we would put it back on after Donald walked away. Luckily Mickey made a big deal about Jack wearing "his" hat.We all had enough (actually more than enough) food to eat and made our way to Kilimanjaro Safaris. This ride is made to be like being on a actual African Safari..the animals roam all over the place and are not in cages. We saw Antelope, Mandrill, Black Rhino, Cheetah,Crocodile,Elephant,Flamingo,Gazelle, Giraffe, Hippopotamus,Lion, Okapis, Ostrich, Warthog, White Rhino and Wildebeest. It was like being in the middle of the zoo :) After this "ride" we did some walking around in Africa and started to wait in a spot for the 3:00 parade. We watched the parade and decided to head for home since the park closed at 5. That night everyone else went to different parks since we were done so early. Ryan, the kids and I decided to head back to the hotel to get some swimming in and go to bed early.