Days 4 and 5: Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom

On the Saturday that Nikki stayed with us, we decided to revisit to Magic Kingdom.

When we first arrived at the Magic Kingdom, we noticed that lots of characters were on Main Street: Mary Poppins, Daisy Duck, Pluto, and Marie (from the Aristocats).

After visiting with Marie, we headed over to ride the kid's favorite ride in the park: It's a Small World. We probably rode it 4 or 5 times while we were there!
 
The entire Mainstreet area was decked out for Halloween. It was so lovely. The pumpkins were carved in true Disney style - with the utmost attention to detail...

 Since we'd already spent a day in Fantasy Land earlier in the week, we decided to make our way to the part of the park that we hadn't really spent a lot of time in: Adventureland. We went to the Tikki room, rode the Jungle Boat Cruise, and Aladdin's Magic Carpet ride. Then we took a break for lunch at Peso Bill's for lunch. I had the Taco salad. It was really yummy. I think that the counter service food at Disney is almost better than the character meal food!

 After lunch, we took the kids to Tom Sawyer's Island to play.

 And then headed over to Frontierland's main street area for a good spot for the afternoon parade.

Before leaving for the day, Avery picked out her present from her Uncle Jordan and Aunt Nikki. She chose Duffy, Mickey's newest friend. It's his teddy bear that he takes on his adventures around the world. She loves it to pieces. 

Charlie was super excited about having his picture taken at the end of the day. Can you tell?

Avery's favorite: 
picking out her new teddy bear.

Charlie's favorite:
The Enchanted Tikki Room

The next day, Nikki headed back home and we went to Animal Kingdom.
This is the picture that I made David take to prove that I actually went on the vacation with the family:

Our first stop was at the Jungle Safari.
During our trek, a giraffe stepped in front of our truck - causing a huge delay. The driver had to wait for the giraffe to decided to move to the other side of the road before she could move on with our tour. And the giraffe was in NO hurry to oblige. I loved it. We have a pretty amazing zoo in our city, but it was pretty cool to see the giraffe that close!

Later in the day, when the sun was blazing and unbearable, we made a pit stop to the Dinosaur Land area. Each park has a "play area" for little guys built in.The  Dinosaur Land play area was exceptionally cool. Avery and Charlie played for at least 45 minutes in the bone digging play area - right under some misting fans.

After that, we enjoyed a little ice cream before heading to see The Lion King musical show.

I would go to Animal Kingdom again just to see that show. It was so good. We were able to sit right on the front row. It was awesome!

After the show, we headed out to get our stroller and noticed a little squirrel hanging around foraging for food. The squirrels at Disney are crazy. They are the most fearless animals I've ever seen. This little guy came right up to us and grabbed this huge cup full of Chips Ahoy cookies. We laughed our hineys off when he dragged it all the way to the bushes.

Our final stop of our long, hot, and totally exhausting day was for dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. Then we all went directly to sleep.

Avery's favorite:
The Jungle Safari Ride.

Charlie's favorite:
playing in the sand in Dinosaur Land.