Disney World Recap 1: Animal Kingdom Lodge

Am I seriously that bad of a blogger that I haven't recapped mine and Dave's solo trip to Disney World...in January?

Yes. Yes I am.

Forgive me, friends. I'm stuck in dance jail until the recital is over on May 20. I love my job and my students, but this time of year is totally dance jail. I'm working 14-15 hour days, painting, typing, choreographing, cutting music, schmoozing advertisers, ordering shirts, sewing costumes, making headpieces...I do have a lot of help this year though which makes things SO MUCH EASIER! :)

So let's see...

Dave and I went to Disney World just the two of us for 5 days in January. We stayed in a Savannah View Room in Kidani Village at the Animal Kingdom Lodge.

It was heaven.

We booked through StayAtWDW.com It was so easy! Kidani Village is a DVC Villa area. By booking through SAWDW, we paid the same for the room as we would have for a moderate resort. The guys at SAWDW were super accommodating, easy to work with and didn't even think I was cray when I was struggling to get our contract to email back to them. They have rooms available at all DVC resorts, Disneyland and Disney Destinations. When we booked, this option wasn't available but it is now...tickets and dining packages can be added! I highly recommend StayAtWDW.com :)

Kidani Village was gorgeous. Dave said we are spoiled now and will have a hard time going back to moderate...I agree. It was stunning. So quiet, peaceful and homey. KV is the quieter side of the resort, Jambo House is the main area and much bigger. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves...

Animals on the Savannah, from the outlook near the KV lobby:

 

Jambo House:

Bus Area

Lobby

Artwork in the lobby...I mean wow.

Looking towards the Savannah, through iron work in the lobby.

Steps down to BOMA!

Gift Shop Area

Water Features near the pool and the Food Court.

Let's talk about the Food Court for a second...we LOVED it. We only ate there once because it was at Jambo and we were staying in KV. (We also were in the parks most of the day each day) The food was super unique and delicious. They did have standard kids' fare, which I was curious about. If I stayed there with R and T, would they have to eat African inspired foods? They'd try it but not eat it for a whole meal...and of course not! PB&J, Chicken Nuggets, Pizza, etc were all available for kids options (or adults too! :)) I wish I had taken pictures of our food...I had some sort of spicy pork sandwich with coleslaw on it and it was AWESOME. Dave had a flat bread pizza with African spices and cheeses...we were both delighted. We ate out by the pool, under a beautiful awning and it was heavenly. 

Do I prefer Port Orleans Riverside food court? Yes, I do for family trips. Bigger, more variety, more familiar foods. For when the kids are older and more adventurous? We'll be in the AK food court a lot, I'm sure!

The pool was GORGEOUS. It was warm but not warm enough for us to swim...there was also a really cool kids play area that I know my kids would have loved.

Back to Kidani Village:

Un-zoomed in (that's a technical term) view from our balcony!!

Zebras out the window

I won't bore you with the (literally) 150 pictures of the animals I took...I will tell you every time I stepped out on our balcony I saw different combos of giraffes, zebras, different types of African deer, Emus, smaller birds, oreks, gazelles, African longhorn cattle...it was AWESOME. The kids would have loved it!

Cons to Animal Kingdom Lodge? Well the busing is weird and messed up. I much preferred Port Orleans way of busing...at AKL it seemed like buses were much more spread out in arriving, never in the same pattern and totally unpredictable. Sometimes they would go to Jambo first and show up to us completely full and vice vera. My suggestion? Leave at least an extra 45 minutes for travel. We waited an HOUR one morning for a Magic Kingdom bus...in January. I can't even imagine the waits in June or July...In our opinion, it's better to kill time at a resort than sitting impatiently at a bus stop :)

Would we stay here again? ABSOLUTELY. It's top of our list right now of places to stay with the kids. 

Place Dave and I want to try on our own next? Grand Flo...we're already saving. Wilderness Lodge, Polynesian...we'll be working our way very slowly through all the Deluxe Resorts!