So, I thought I had done my plan, but I haven’t and we are leaving tomorrow. Yikes! There are 10 of us altogether, but my boys are 8 and 11.
I more or less know what the ‘must dos’ are. Any that you wouldn’t bother with? And tips on best times to do certain things would be great too!
Is the train to Rafiki’s Planet and Affection Section and Conservation Station worth it? My 11 year old is unsure. How long does it take? We have been to many great zoos, both here and abroad, so I’m dubious as to how much different it could possibly be, even though I’ve read I shouldn’t dismiss it like that.
And I have the Nemo musical on the list, but not the Lion King. We’ve never actually seen the Lion King. Should we add it anyway? I might be able to borrow the movie and watch it on the trip down.
Lion King > Nemo. The acrobatics are fun to watch even for adults. You don’t have to watch the movie. We only did Nemo after our 4th time to the park and did not regret the wait.
Rafiki took us around 50 minutes to do. There is a petting zoo, some activities along the trail to a centre, you see Rafiki. It can easily be skipped.
Boneyard can be skipped at that age.
What are your FP? Rope drop with 10 can be tough if another family is not on board. I try and have a FP for Safari and Everest in the afternoon. We do Everest at Rope drop and then around to Dinausaur and that area. We see Lion King after/before the FP with safari after lunch.
Nemo rocks too! Don’t skip that. I did the Rifiki watch last time. I was thinking it was a waste but then we got pictures with chip and dale and did not have to wait at all… for that it was worth it.
You can get so much done in the morning at AK! I think more than any other park. Do Everest if you think you want to ride it more than the one time (we did it like 3 times in the first 20min).
My older kids (16, 13 and 9) prefer Lion King over Nemo. DH and I took DD5 to Nemo and my older kids skipped it to go standby on EE. We all really liked FOW. I’ll second going at RD to ride EE many times in a row.
We have FP+ for Everest (10), Safari (11:35) and Kari Rapids (12:50), but when I optimize the plan it ignores them. Dinosaur is closed which is a bummer. I don’t think I want to ride Kari Rapids that early anyway (and be wet), so will probably just wing that one for the afternoon and maybe change it to something else.
There are 10 of us, but my sister would be first in to Animal Kingdom if it were up to her. Haha. I think she’s more excited than her kids. But, either way, we have our own cars and are driving separately.
Just a suggestion, if possible, change the Kali River FP to a time right before you plan on leaving, maybe after a Flights Of Wonder show? It looks like the FOW show is really close on a map. I planned my FOW show to overlap halfway into my Kali Fastpass window so when the show is over, I have 30 minutes until the end of my Kali FP window. As for why the TP is not acknowledging your FP, I won’t take a stab at that, I’m kind of a newbie, but I’ve seen a few posts suggesting to make sure they are entered by using that “add” option for each one.
So, I have all the trails in my plan…Discovery Trail, Gorilla Falls and Maharajah Jungle Trek. Do they all feel different enough to be worth doing all of them?
Why does it keep putting Tree of Life Awakenings at 7:15pm in my plan even though there is 2 hours of free time beforehand? Does something happen at 7:15?
The Tree of Life show only happens when it gets dark. I’ve never been at this time of year but I’d guess that’s when it is dark enough to begin. I think Gorilla Falls and Maharajah Jungle are both worth doing. They do get busy but I definitely wouldn’t do them at RD - riding EE is a much better use of your time. You should see Lion King, it really is better than Nemo, though that’s pretty cute. We skip FOW - as you say a bird show is a bird show. I’d skip Rafiki/Conservation Station too unless you want to meet Rafiki.
If you want to force the planning software to use your FP times (when you optimize; if you are using evaluate, it won’t move things), you can expand the Advanced Options (green plus) in the FastPass Reservations section of your touring plan, and there’s a checkbox that says, “Force Optimize to use my FastPasses” or something like that.
