Welcome to Disney’s Animal Kingdom during one of the busiest weeks of the year. This park is rapidly evolving and we are excited to take you for a quick photo tour of all the recent changes.
There are two giant cranes in the Avatar construction area.Love the AK Christmas tree.
You can see the new metal detectors at the entrance. This has happened at all of the parks in Orlando, including Universal and Sea World. Kind of ugly, but if it is permanent, I’m thinking Disney will blend it in to the theme eventually.Another view on the cranes.
Near the entrance to Rainforest Cafe, you can see a lot of the work being done on Pandora.The new Riverside Depot is now open on the right hand side of the main entrance path.
Sadly, on the inside, it is a generic Disney merchandise store. In a park rich in detail, this shop doesn’t measure up.This is about the extent of the detail present here.
View of the progress on Rivers of Light, which bows this spring.Note the new island.
There is a retainer in the lagoon right before the Rivers of Light work area.Yeah, just a little bit crowded this time of the year.
There are new light projectors along the shores of the lake.The old Everest Fastpass distribution location is now a food and beverage location.It has cool nods to the rest of the park and feels like it has been there forever.One of the control towers for Rivers of Light.70 minute standby for Everest. Ouch.
I love Harambe’s holiday decorations.
Tree of Life pathway walled off.
The Tree of Life Garden sign has moved from the front of the park to over by Starbucks/Pizzafari. Perhaps it’ll be reopening soon with no nets? We can dream, right?It is currently closed off.You know it is busy when…Pizzafari got a facelift on the outside, but looks largely the same on the inside.It looks like there are some changes/expansions happening on the back end of the restaurant.Finally, Disney has acknowledged the Avatar presence coming to the park.
Animal Kingdom is building a new restaurant called “Tiffins”, which will “celebrate the art of traveling.” Tiffins will have waterfront views from both indoor and outdoor seating.
This is the official concept art released for the restaurant. What do you think of it?
Time to head out!
That does it for this week? How excited are you for the changes at this park? Let us know in the comments below. Thanks for reading!
If you appreciate what we do here and would like to support Dateline Disney World, you can shop at Amazon.com using my link (please CLICK HERE before you do). It won’t cost you any extra, and it’ll help out the column!!
