Our day started out at the wee early hours of the morning, and by that, I mean 3am. Luckily, Danny has been able to tame my horrible sleeping schedule and got me to go to bed at 7pm the night before, free of anxiety and with a little bit of Nyquil to knock me out. By the time I woke up, I didn't feel like I wanted to die. Luckily, the morning was smooth sailing. We got to JFK in one piece, checked in R2-D2 and got through security within a hour. My only complaint is that security at JetBlue's terminal is highly incompetent and unorganized unlike Orlando, which I'll never understand.
Once we touched down in Orlando, we were off to Danny's first ride on the Magical Express, which has gotten less magical in the past year or so since Disney announced the end to their complimentary bus service to and from the Orlando International Airport beginning January 2022. Once we arrived to Art of Animation (my home away from home) to drop off our luggage, we were off to the races with the rest of the gang. Naturally, our day started off with taking photos at the Tree of Life. This was Danny's first test at taking lame, lovely dovey couple photos with me. Unfortunately for him, Disney relaxed their mask policy for our trip, and were allowing guests to take off their masks for photos outdoors. He couldn't hide behind his masks this trip as much as he wanted to lol. I know that it's awkward for him, and he's not super comfortable being in front of the camera like I am, but I think we were still successful in taking cute photos throughout the park. "Look at me like you love me."
What's also funny is, earlier in the day, Chinh gave Danny and I "Happily Ever After" pins to wear. In hindsight, this was a bad decision for more reasons than one lol, but I'll stick to the obvious. "Happily Ever After" pins are usually worn by newlyweds or couples celebrating their anniversary, so throughout the park, Cast Members were congratulating us LOL. It actually made me excited for when I can wear these pins with Danny, and say we are actually married. It just felt really natural to me.
Throughout the day, we were able to tackle Avatar Flight of Passage, Expedition Everest, Kilimanjaro Safaris, Dinosaur, and (at Danny's request) TriceraTop Spin. After going on Expedition Everest for a second time, it is definitely one of my top five favorite roller coasters in Disney. Usually I dread going backwards on coasters because the ride is always annoyingly bumpy, but Everest is a very smooth coaster throughout the whole experience, which I appreciate. Both Danny and I agreed that Avatar and Everest are the best rides at Animal Kingdom currently. I'm really glad he enjoyed the rides at AK, and didn't want to kill me for taking him on a coaster. We were testing the waters with this one lol. Also, being that this was my first day on vlogging duty, I'm happy I was able to capture footage of some of the animals during our Safari journey. I was super excited to see the tigers out this time around. Animals are always unpredictable, and so the tigers were rather sleepy cats when we were on the Safari back in October. We stopped at the Starbucks in the park for a snack break. I'm disappointed that Animal Kingdom no longer has the Simba soft pretzel, but they do have a Mickey-shaped cinnamon bun! It was super cute and delicious paired with my Pink drink.
Once we conquered Animal Kingdom, it was off to the other kingdom for our dinner reservation at Liberty Tree Tavern. I figured Danny would love this restaurant because unlimited servings of mashed potatoes are what dreams are made of in his eyes. After a long day, I was excited to sit down with the crew and stuff my face with all my favorite Thanksgiving dishes. Well, I was right. He was super excited for the massive serving of mashed potatoes that I almost didn't get any myself. I had to yell at him to put some on my plate before he hoarded it all for himself LOL. I didn't really anticipate how much of it he was going to eat this night. I totally underestimated his love for mashed potatoes. It really warms my heart that he enjoys this place so much because, it is by far, my favorite restaurant in all of Disney's parks. It is a must do for me during every vacation, and luckily, the reservation is always easy to snag.
My favorite part of this whole entire day was getting to walk down Main Street for the first time ever with Danny. There's nothing like the feeling I get when I turn the corner to see Cinderella's castle off in the distance. Now, with her current facelift for the 50th anniversary, she's even more beautiful than I could have ever imagined! The whole experience was just magical. It was a dream come true to finally experience this with Danny after months of planning for this trip. We took our first of many photos in front the castle this evening, and they came out adorable!
This was my second visit in recent years to the park, and I’m still not a fan of Animal Kingdom. For our next trip, I think we’re going to do our two favorite rides, and then run off to the other Kingdom to chill for the rest of the day. At least, I feel satisfied in what we accomplished for Danny this day.
Next up... our first full day in Magic Kingdom!
Hahaha I'm glad he enjoyed Everest!
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