Episode 25: Animals, Animals, Animals… & Festival of the Lion King – Walt Disney World – September 2016
We are at Animal Kingdom in Walt Disney World for the day! We have so many plans, let’s see what all we can find…
Huge surprise here…
Are you ready for it??? We visited with the animals… at Animal Kingdom!!! J But in all seriousness, we love exploring the shaded and overgrown lush trails of the Maharajah Jungle Trek with the multitude of animals.
With exhibits for Komodo dragons, Malayan tapirs, giant fruit bats, Asian deer and lets not forget the mac daddy of animals in this area… the Bengal tigers! We actually had a really interesting Cast Member at the Komodo dragons who had a skull and showed us how they could unhinge their jaws to eat animals much larger than themselves… these things can take down a water buffalo for goodness sakes!!!
Our boys always love the giant bats and their area is fascinating! They are right there with no glass between us and them and the boys are always afraid they are going to come through, but they are so big that the opening was not large enough for them. There is also some great artwork of what we like to dub ‘the bat cave’ where larger than life bats are painted around you.
And our biggest surprise of the morning was the tigers! They were up and active! Every time I have seen a large cat like these they are usually just laying around or sleeping but these were moving around and even rolling on the ground, I am pretty sure they were trying to get a itch on their backs…
Birds of Wonder
Today was the first time ever we had seen the Birds of Wonder show and we loved it! This is about a 25 minute interactive show which tells a story of a reluctant explorer who is a bit afraid of large birds but comes to like and respect them with some help from Guano Jane. This is a large covered (aka nice shaded cool area) pavilion which the birds have free reign and fly from front to back from one handler to another, even flying low enough that their tail feathers may brush your head… as they did mine!
The show includes such special species as:
- Blue and Gold Macaws
- Trumpeter Hornbill
- African Grey Parrot
- Rose-Breasted Cockatoo
- Great Horned Owl
- Red-Legged Seriema
- Harris Hawk
- East African Crowned Crane
We really enjoyed this show as it was entertaining and informational and we will definitely be back!
Our favorite show…
So at this point it was the beginning of our FastPass window to begin for Kilimanjaro Safaris, but… someone obviously made a mistake and allowed too many to be booked at the same time because the FastPass line was crazy long! So we decided to let it calm down a bit and while in Africa decided to catch the Festival of the Lion King show that was just starting.
We made it in and sat at the very top of one of the sections. I thought these would be bad seats but they were actually pretty great! Being at the highest point in the theater provided a wonderful view of the entire show. This is my absolute favorite show at Walt Disney World! Festival of the Lion King is funny, beautiful, heart warming, lively and fun! The Tumble Monkeys at the beginning are so funny and so talented! Love their trapeze act! The fire show during ‘Be Prepared’ is dark and beautiful and I always wonder how he does not burn himself???
And my favorite part is during ‘Can You Feel The Love Tonight’ when the two ‘birds’ are dancing and she is lifted up and takes flight… breathtaking! This always brings tears to my eyes! And the ending with the entire ensemble singing and dancing and merging the pieces of each song into one cohesive show is so much fun! Everyone is clapping and singing Hakuna Matata and genuinely having a good time. And this is why we NEVER miss this show when we visit Animal Kingdom!!!
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Thanks,
Alisa
EECC Travels
