Free Day at Disney's Animal Kingdom

Hello from the Haantz Family!

Monday, we enjoyed Disney's Animal Kingdom for free (well, except for $14.00 parking).  We did the "Give A Day, Get A Day" promotion where you volunteer a day of your time and get a day free.  The program is in the end stages already and are no longer allowing organizations to schedule any more volunteer opportunities as they have almost made their goal of 1 million volunteers (they are currently over 600,000).

On Martin Luther King Day, my son and I made Valentine's Day cards and paper flowers for the senior citizen facialities in our area.  We worked for about 2 1/2 hours and they gave us a snack and breaks so the time flew by.  It was the easiest and most fun volunteer day I've ever done.

My husband had to work that day so he had to do another volunteer opportunity that fit into his schedule.  He chose to work 4 hours at the Habitat for Humanities ReStore store.  It was harder work but he said it was rewarding.

This was our first time at the Animal Kingdom park.  We have been to most of the other Disney parks so we chose this one out of the four we were allowed to use our volunteer vouchers for.  Our choices were Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom, and HollyWood Studios.

It was a beautiful day with the temp. topping out at a perfect 76 degrees.  We had little to no wait on the rides, with the exception being the Expedition Everest roller coaster ride which was around 30 minutes.  The ride was well worth it though.  I put it in my top 10 roller coaster rides of all time.  The coaster goes both backward and forwards and changes tracks so you never know where you are heading.  It also seemed longer than most of the coasters I've been on which made it even more cool.

We visited everything we wanted to in the park, including the 3D Bugs show, Dinosaur Land U.S.A where the Dinosaur ride is located, Mount Everest Roller Coaster, the African safari, and many other fun adventures.  The park is only open from 9AM - 5PM to allow time for the park attendants to wrangle the animals back into their night enclosures and feed them so you want to get there early.

We ended our day with a dinner at the Rainforest Cafe and spent a little money in their gift shop. It was a most excellent day and the park was nice.  We were not expecting a lot from this park so we were pleasently surprised by its diverse activities geared toward all ages.  I have posted pictures from our day of fun for your enjoyment; click here: Disney's Animal Kingdom SlideShow