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Published: September 11th 2013
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Day 2 started early, not because of the hooting water taxis on the waterways through the night or the sound of the jet turbine powered jet washer cleaning the sunbeds and deck outside of our window but because our bodies were still on UK time.
Skipping breakfast with 'excitement' we boarded another (free) Disney Magical Express bus to Animal Kingdom. Although you can (and I do) knock the Disney experience, it is impressive that the transportation is all free wherever you go ( no need for passes or anything) , there is free wifi wherever u go, there are free apps to show you ride wait times, nearest toilets, nearest fagzones, nearest restaurants etc. etc. You can pay for pretty much anything in any park or restaurant on your hotel room card and if you do buy stuff outside the hotel, they will transport it back to your hotel FOC without any additional cost. It's very, very slick!
Animal Kingdom hasn't really changed in the past few years...there are some excellent bits (the gorilla walk and tiger walk) a very rushed safari tour where you get 5 secs to snap each animal as your frantic, over caffeined, graduate, cheerleader/driver whizzes you round a
safari tour in 15 mins, following a poor script that has never changed. The setup is impressive and you do get close up to the animals, but even her warning to set your cameras to 'action shot' was not enough to capture them at warp speed from the back of a bouncing safari lorry.
Rides are limited here but I did manage acouple of gos on Expedition Everest, a rather dated runaway train' type ride and then we both managed a go on the Kali River Rapids. Ms. Lightweight opted for the Disney poncho, whereas big brave me went for the ' it's only a bit if water, ponchos are for wimps' approach.
As we boarded, my scientific calculations went into overdrive as I worked out that if we sat on the empty side of the boat to the five 'rather heavy' Mexicans we were sharing with, their weight would hit the front and we'd be left high and dry! How wrong can you be and 5 mins later, 5 semi dry Mexicans, one very dry Englishwoman and one soaking wet, bedraggled, drowned, fat rat of a bloke, exited the ride. 48 hours later I still don't think over dryed out!
Using the
disney app we picked our way round the park, visited the (again slightly dated) Jurassic park/dinosaur flight ride, had a semi decent cheeseburger but by about 3pm we were done. Maybe it's because we've done it before several times before but apart from the animals, the park just felt a bit lacking on entertainment and very dated with little having changed over the years!
Back on the bus and a chance to snooze by the pool for the remainder of the afternoon, under a parasol as the traditional Florida afternoon showers came and went!
In the evening, we boarded the water taxi and headed for downtown Disney once again. This time we ate on the waters edge at Portobello, a nice little Italian restaurover with a terrace overlooking the lake. The food was great but the service too good with starters and main courses arriving almost simultaneously! After that it was another walk, a bit more entertainment and the sight of some very strange people including an 80+ year old guy dressed in hot pants, shiny shorts and mirrored aviator sunglasses who appeared at just about any live music stage we got to dancing away in his own little world, mainly with hundreds of kids who were at the front at each venue. After a couple of bottles of red it took a lot of strength to stop Shas from getting up on stage and joining him.
At the end of the night on the way back to the water taxi, we came across the Disney Christmas shop. It is very weird to be in 30 degrees in Florida walking round a shop playing carols with just about every type of Disney themed decoration you could think of....luckily we managed to get out alive without a complete Rapunzel themed Christmas tree in tow!
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