Don’t Feed the Giraffes

Today is a short blogging day and no interesting photos as it was a travelling day. We had a relaxing start then took the shuttle to the airport. This time no problems with check-in and with smart packing and loading up our carry-on, we both managed to get under the 50 pound luggage limit. Our first flight took us from New Orleans to Miami and even though it was 25mins late in leaving, this was caught up during the 90min flight. Of course the departure gate for our next flight to Orlando was the furtherest gate away from the arrival lounge. We arrived here after the posted boarding time, but once again the late arrival of the incoming plane meant a delayed departure. This next flight was only 60 minutes, but with being seated in the second last row of the plane, it seemed like nearly another hour to get off the plane. Once we collected our luggage, we wandered over to Terminal B where we located the Disney Magical Express transportation buses to the Disney Resort. We were surprised that there were no signs indicating the direction to go to find this, and luckily I had brought a printout from the web regarding the complimentary transfer.

We finally arrived at the hotel at 7.30pm – and were checked in by a friendly castmember (as they are called), named Jon, who was English, but married to an Aussie and we could detect that some of her accent had rubbed off on him. After dumping our luggage in our room we headed straight for the dinner buffet. Unfortunately it was prime-time, and without a reservation, we had to take a beeper and wait. We decided to wait in the nearby bar where we both enjoyed a cocktail. Our beeper went off just as Joe was finishing his drink, and we were escorted into the African themed restaurant. Here there was an array of African food on offer, from Cajun spiced roast beef, Moroccan couscous and many other dishes that are now too hard to remember but were delicious. There was also a vast array of single serve dessert tasters that were hard to stop at having six or more.. you gotta try them all!!

Why is your departure gate always the furtherest away that it can be from your arrival gate when you have connecting flights???

Back in our room we started to pour over the vast array of brochures for things to do across the resorts and parks. We are staying at the Animal Kingdom lodge, which is integrated into an animal park and our room backs onto one of the Savannahs. Upon trying to open the sliding door to the balcony, a sticker on the window warns us to not feed the Giraffes.  Well, I suppose we are on the second floor. It should be interesting to see what wanders by on the Savannah while we are here...

Tomorrow we have an early start with our planned tour of the Kennedy Space Centre...