After an excellent day of touring at the Animal Kingdom, I
still had a full evening planned: Animal Kingdom Lodge for some exploring and
dinner at Boma, followed by a shopping and reveling visit to Downtown
Disney. The busses from Animal Kingdom
to the Lodge were packed; I had to wait for a second one. On that one I got a seat, but they packed
guests into the bus like a Tokyo
subway. Right behind me there was a
group of about 10 Brazilian guests celebrating someone's birthday - loudly.
After circling through Kidani
Village (no time to stop
on this trip), the bus pulled up at the Animal Kingdom Lodge.
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| Approaching the Animal Kingdom Lodge from th bus stop. |
Personally, I think this may be the most architecturally
beautiful building in all of Walt Disney World.
My "dream vacation" would be 10 days at the Lodge, overlooking
the Arusha savannah. Someday - maybe...
If the building is impressive from the outside, it is absolutely breathtaking
once you enter the main doors.
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| The amazing lobby pf the Animal Kingdom Lodge from the front entrance. |
As you can see from the picture, outdoor light was
fading fast, so I resisted the desire to stop and gawk and went directly to the
animal viewing area in back of Jambo House in hopes of getting some animal
pictures before I lost my light. I was
almost too late. Between the dim light and the need to use a telephoto lens,
most of the several dozen pictures I took came out blurry; here are two that,
although not very good, show some of the sights on the Arusha Savannah. The
thought of being able to wake up every morning to the sight of giraffes and
zebras just past my patio excites me more than just about any attraction in any
of the parks.
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| Zebra on the Arusha Savannah at the Animal Kingdom Lodge |
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| Graffes on the Arusha Savannah at the Animal Kingdom Lodge. |
After watching the animals for about a half hour, I went
back into the Lodge to do some exploring before my dinner reservation.
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| Etering the Animal Kingdom Lodge from the animal viewing area. |
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| The main floor of the Animal Kingdom Lodge lobby |
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| An African-inspired sculpture in the main lobby |
The main lobby is immense,
and I could easily have spent an hour just checking out all of the nooks
and crannies, but I did have a dinner reservation to make. On my previous trip
my wife and I had dinner at Jiko with one of my old high school friends (who is
even more into WDW than I am - it that's possible). I cannot recommend it
highly enough; it's one of the top 3 meals that I have had at WDW, following
Victoria and Albert's and California Grill.
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| The entrance to Jiko, one of my favorite restaurants at Walt Disney World |
After stopping in at Jiko for a few pictures, I still
had some time before my Boma reservation, so I stopped at the Victoria
Falls lounge for a pre-dinner drink. To me, this is a "hidden gem"; it's
a beautiful, quiet spot for a drink, overlooking the hub-bub of Boma - and to
sweeten things even more, they accept Tables in Wonderland for drinks.
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| Looking down at the Victoria Falls Lounge from upper level |
After an
especially good margarita, I went downstairs for my (first) dinner at Boma.
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| Wide view of Boma |
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| The main Boma dining room is designed to look like it is under a series of giant umbrellas |
I won't give a full dinner review here, but suffice it to
say that if anyone leave hungry, it's their own fault. It was quite good, but
after all of the "over-the-top" reviews that it gets, I have to say
that I was slightly disappointed. The famed "Zebra Domes", however,
DO live up to all of the accolades, and if I hadn't already eaten so much, I
could easily have eaten more than the 3
that I did.
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| Zebra Domes - a delightful confection of cake, mocha mousse, and white and dark chocolate ganache. Mmmmm... |
Although I was tempted to just go back up to Victoria Falls for an after dinner drink and relax, I had
a Downtown Disney shopping list from my wife and her best friend, and to me a
visit to WDW is not complete without a stop at Raglan Road, I moved on, back to the
busses. After a painless ride (on a
mostly empty bus), I arrived at Downtown Disney.
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| Entrance to Downtown Disney |
I'll say up front that I am not a HUGE fan of Downtown
Disney. Back when Pleasure Island
was still running, DTD really was a destination in and of itself, but since all
of those venues were closed, it's really just a an outdoor shopping mall with a
few "headliner" restaurants - and an amazing Cirque du Soliel
show. Having never been there at night
with my good camera, however, it did offer some interesting (and challenging)
photography opportunities. For my fellow
photographers reading this blog, all of the following (as well as most of the
AKL pictures) were taken using the HDR process.
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| A favorite dining spot of many Downtown Disney visitors |
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| Can you say hot fudge sundea? |
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| Portabello - for a more formal Italian dining experience |
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| T-Rex - a fun but frenetic restaurant from the creators of Rainforest Cafe |
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| Fulton's Crab House, from across the lagoon |
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| A Lego sea serpent across from the Lego store |
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| For all of your Mr. Potato Head needs... |
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| One of the entrances to The World of Disney - the largest Disney store in the world |
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| One of the decorations in the immense World of Disney store |
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| The cieling of the "main" room of the World of Disney |
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| The carousel in the Downtown Disney Marketplace |
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| Picture spot with Pooh and friends |
My primary shopping destination was the Kitchen store, where all things Disney can be found for the cooking enthusiast. In particular, I needed to get more "Pirate Spice Blend" - an excellent combination of peppers and other seasonings in a table grinder.
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| Chef Mickey at the Downtown Disney Kitchen Store |
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| Donald in the window of the kitchen store |
A "must visit" location is the Disney Days of Christmas. Although I did not buy anything there this trip, I am embarrassed to admit how many hundreds of dollars I have left behind here on previous trips...
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| A dangerous sight for for the Christmas-obsessed like I am (we put up 22 Christmas trees every year...) |
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| Mickey in the window of Disney Days of Christmas |
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| And Minnie... |
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| And you can't forget Pluto! |
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| A small taste of the treasures to be found in Disney Days of Christmas |
One of my favorite stores in DTD is the Art of Disney, and
although most of the merchandise is well beyond my means, I love to look.
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| One of my favorite spots in Downtown Disney |
I have always been a fan of the art of Mary Blair whose
stylings were so important to the "Disney look" from the 40s through
the 60s. I was VERY happy to see that Disney has finally started to market
various lines of merchandise featuring her artwork!
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| Merchandise featuring the artwork of Mary Blair |
Had my shopping budget been bigger this trip, this set would
now be in my kitchen!
Shopping aside, my
main reason for the trip to DTD was to stop by Raglan Road for a few pints of stout and
some music.
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| The Cooks of Dublin - Raglan Road's Counter Service outdoor pub |
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| Entrance to Raglan Road - my REAL reason for going to Downtown Disney |
If you've never been to Raglan Road, you MUST go. Many elements
of the "pub" were imported from Ireland (as was most of the staff),
and it's a great fun evening for all ages. The music is world class, and combines
the sounds of Riverdance, the Clancy
Brothers, and Drop Kick Murphy's all in one great group. The dancers are also excellent.
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| The main bar at Raglan Road |
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| The Raglan Road band |
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| Solo dancer at Raglan Road |
I also HIGHLY recommend the food; lunches lean towards
typical "pub fare", but the dinners are considerably more formal,
representing the high end of traditional and contemporary Irish cooking. And
you can't beat the beer! Although I could have easily stayed well past
midnight, I was a bit paranoid about catching the last bus back to Shades of
Green, so after only 2 pints of Guinness, I called it a night. I had a few
extra minutes before I had to start the hike to the bus station, so I
fast-strolled around the "West Side"
of DTD, taking pictures as I went.
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| Entrance to Downtown Disney West Side |
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| The Characters in Flight balloon, docked for the night |
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| A view of the main West Side concourse |
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| Planet Hollywood - Look but don't eat. |
After my brief sojourn in the West End, I made my way across
the parking lot (which, after nearly 16 hours of touring, seemed to be a large
as the Sahara) and caught the midnight bus
back to Shades of Green.
Coda: All week Shades of Green had been advertising a
planned power outage (something to do with upgrading the fire/security system)
that was supposed to go from 1:30 - 3:00 AM (no big deal). I got back to the
room at 12:30, and FIVE MINUTES later, all the power went off. Seems as though they changed the schedule
sometime in the morning, but as I hadn't been back to the room since 7:30, I
"didn't get the message". I
suppose it was better that it happened just as I was about to get into the
shower vice happening while I was IN it :-) With no distractions, it was easy
to get to sleep quickly - but it WAS kind of jarring when all of the lights in
the room came back on at 2:30... but I still made Rope Drop at Magic Kingdom 5
1/2 hours later! Stay tuned for my next blog which will be Magic Kingdom (part
2), EPCOT (part 2), and will culminate with a legendary Liner Meet-up.
