When planning our Walt Disney World trip I tried to be strategic. I was travelling with the entire family and this was our first big vacation. Because of this I decided our first day at Walt Disney World we would spend at Animal Kingdom. Animal Kingdom is the smaller of the parks with the shortest opening hours. I had read everywhere that this Animal Kingdom could easily be completed in one day so it was the winner for our first park visit.
Surprisingly we woke up bright and early even though we had arrived at our hotel room at 11:30 at night the night before. I guess you could say we were a tad excited to start our vacation. We got dressed and loaded the entire family up with sunscreen. We then packed our cooler with water and some snacks and headed on our way. We used Disney transportation and it took us about 15 minutes to arrive at Animal Kingdom.
As soon as we arrived we headed to the very back of the park to make our fast past for Kilimanjaro Safari. I had specifically booked this fast pass for first thing in the morning as according to reviews it was one of the best times to be able to see the most animals. As it gets hotter in the day the animals retreat to shaded areas and are harder to see from the route. My research worked and we got to see almost all the animals.
After the safari we got to spend some time exploring Animal Kingdom until it was time to head to our next fast pass. Big Brother is obsessed with roller coasters and has wanted to go on one for a long time. The main roller coaster at Animal Kingdom is Expedition Everest. It seemed kind of scary for me for his first roller coaster. However we looked up videos on YouTube and Big Brother insisted he wanted to ride it. So going with what he wanted I had booked Expedition Everest as our second fast pass.
To my amazement Big Brother LOVED riding Mount Everest. Since Little Brother was way too small to ride Mount Everest we has used their rider switch program. This is where one adult stays with those too young to ride while the other goes on with their party. Once they are done the other adult gets to take 3 party members with them and go through he fast pass line to ride as well. Big Brother went on AGAIN with Tobei, this is how much he loved Mount Everest. Once they were done riding we went to the gift shop and bought Big Brother a pin that says he conquered Mount Everest.
Overall our first day at Walt Disney World was a giant success. We were back to our hotel room in time to get the kids to bed at a decent hour and get our rest to conquer our next day at Walt Disney World which was guaranteed to be a long one. No rest for this family, we are on vacation lol.