Disney... Day 4!!

Drew at the fountains... love this pic :)


Matt and the kids on some big dinosaur.




The girls with Chip.. or Dale... not sure which




Drew with his little girlfriend. :)


Today is Animal Kingdom. This is the park I am least looking forward to. I HATE the zoo... and I'm a bit worried this is just a glorified zoo. =P

Our plan is once again waking up early and getting there when the park opens. Everyone wakes up pretty well and we have our room service breakfast... donuts again. lol This time we added a little juice because I'm starting to feel guilty at all the crap I've let these kids eat. =P

Hop on the bus... no problems this morning. And arrive at the park. I tell Matt that I have a "secret" entrance into the park that not too many people know about. This will allow us to be ahead of all the crowds. There's a Rainforest Cafe that opens right into Animal Kingdom. He of course is skeptical that we won't be able to get through that way but since all my other plans have worked out so well he's willing to try it. We get there and there's only a couple other families there. Start talking to them and discover they were subscribers to the same VIP site I was. And here Matt thought I was the only nut who did this. lol This one lady's husband admired my little notecards and turned around and told his wife she needed to do it my way. Apparently they had been carrying around this HUGE binder of info all week... which he looked none too thrilled about. haha Anyways... so they open the doors about 15 minutes before the rest of the park can get in and we walk right in. Then we had to go stand where they have the actual rope drop... where you can go further into the park. Since we went through that secret entrance we were at the very front...awesome! Matt and Hannah are going to be riding Expedition Everest and Brooke, Drew and I will go get fastpasses for the Safari. Now this park is HUGE and the amount of walking you have to do is unreal! Add to it the fact that it's 400 degrees hotter than the other parks because of all the plants and trees that they have for all the animals! Ropde drops and once again we are stuck in the middle of a herd of cattle. AND we have to go uphill the whole way to get there! And this is when Brooke falls apart... I sooo knew it was coming! lol She tells me she can't walk anymore.. it's too hot... she's too tired... take Drew out of the stroller so I can sit... or push us both... are you freaking kidding me! It's all I can do to push Drew and Hugo... let alone add her to the mix! So I start making all kinds of bribes... I'll buy you ice cream... a toy... hell I'll pay you just to get where we need to go. But she's NOT having it! And here we are... stuck in the middle of a thousand people who are all trying to get to the same place. =P Ahhh. this is such a relaxing vacation. lol

We finally get the fastpasses and then have to walk ALL the way over to the other side of the park to get back to Matt and Hannah. Matt calls me and tells me to hurry so I can ride the roller coaster right away too. Um yea...not happening! As much as I love roller coasters.... there is no way in hell I'm hauling ass yet again in this ungodly heat! And Brooke is finally settled down again and god knows we don't want to repeat that little scene! So we took our time and stopped to smell the roses... or was it elephant shit? lol We see a few different kinds of birds along the way and of course Brooke asks me what they are. Um..not a clue! Then this cast member hears her and stops to tell Brooke all about the birds. OMG... I should've just told her they were vulchers and been done with that. But nooo... we have to listen to this lady go on and on about what they are, how long they live, where they're from... did I tell you I hate the zoo! =P Seriously... my idea of hell is having to work at the zoo! We finally break free of this woman... thank you Drew... he no longer wanted to hear this lady talk. lol

We all meet up in Dinoland and ride a few rides. Drew can only ride a few things here so he wants to ride this ride that goes round and round 15 times! Since there's no wait they let us ride as many times as we want. Now normally spinning rides never bother me... but at this point I'm about to hurl. =P We then go play at the boneyard... which is basically a glorified playground that's about 150 degrees! We've already gone through $10 in water and it's only 9:30!

We head back across the park to ride the Safari. This is really cool... if you're into animals. It's basically like an African Safari... and I promptly tell the kids this is the closest they will ever get to Africa! No way in hell will you ever find me paying that kind of money to chase a bunch of zebras. =P On our little safari we see elephants, rhinos, giraffes, hippos, ostrichs, crocodiles,flamingos, tigers, wildabeast...can't remember what else. This is definitely my way of touring a zoo. Sit in a little jeep for 20 minutes and see it all! lol

We then see the Lion King show... best show ever! It's a long show and Drew was just mesmerized the whole time! Hannah got pulled up to be a part of the show for a few minutes... the rest of the kids were all really young so she was so embarrassed... she's definitely a teenager. =P

We ate a quick lunch ... pizza which wasn't terrible but definitely not my favorite. And then headed over to the water ride.. Kali River Rapids. Drew just misses the height requirement so I go to find us a shady spot to wait in and Drew enounters a fountain along the way... and in he goes! It took them about 20 minutes to ride and in that 20 minutes Drew had a blast! He decided his clothes were weighing him down since they were soaked so he took them off... right there... underwear and all ! People were cracking up... and I'll admit so was I. :) He didn't quite understand why he had to put atleast his shorts back on. lol

After that we did a few more rides and then decided if we didn't all want to have heat stroke we needed to get the hell out of there! And since I didn't get to ride the water ride... or run through a fountain naked ;)... I was complaining about how hot I was. So Matt decided to cool me off and dump an entire water bottle on me! OMG... do you have any idea how long it will take this padded bra to dry! lol

I've decided that I definitely like Animal Kingdom more than the zoo.. but it's not my favorite park by any means. Maybe if they could air condition it and add a few more coasters I would enjoy it more. lol

We head back to the resort, shower and change and decide to head offsite for dinner. The kids choose Golden Corral. Can't be too bad right? Wrong! Obviously Florida doesn't have health codes... because this place is sick! Flies everywhere... I kid you not! Food clearly isn't cooked properly and the ice cream is green! So we paid $65 for dinner that no one ate. Thank god they have those Rice Krispy treats back at the resort. lol

Since we don't have to get up early tomorrow... not doing any parks... we decide to let the kids stay up late and swim. Drew and I seek out to find the fountains because he seems to really love playing in them. We get there and immediately this little girl befriends him. Drew of course is showing off for her.. typical boy. lol She follows him all over the place and Drew's loving every minute of it. Another little girl comes up and wants to play with Drew too... but the first little girl tells her she can't play because " he's mine!". Fabulous... he's 3 year old and already taken. lol We then head back over to the pool after hid "girlfriend" leaves and he gets in with the girls. All 3 of them play for over an hour... passing a beach ball back and forth, diving for toys, catching Drew as he jumps in, etc. Matt and I sit on the side and relish in the fact that for the first time ever the 3 of them are getting along AND enjoying it! lol We didn't go back to the room until after 11pm! Showered.. which this whole business of 5 people and 1 shower si geting to be annoying lol .. and then hit the food court for a snack... aka dinner. lol

Tomorrow we have to switch resorts... I just can't wait to clean up all this mess! =P And we're hitting Downtown Disney for some serious shopping! Matt is already dreading the shopping....