Safari Under the Stars

We love to show our clients all the unique experiences you can have at Disney World.  While we mostly think of the rides and the characters, there are lots of other things to do when visiting Disney World.

On our recent trip we took a Starlight Safari, which was definitely a unique way to spend a part of our night.  Follow along for all the cool details and videos of extraordinary experience.

Our night begins over at Animal Kingdom Lodge.  The Starlight Safari is just one of those cool experiences you can have at a Disney Deluxe Resort, but you don't have to be staying there to experience this one.  Like most Disney extras a reservation is required.  Since we knew we were going to end up at Animal Kingdom Lodge we also made an earlier dinner reservation at Boma for a fantastic meal.

The Starlight Safari happens twice each night, once at 8:30pm and again at 10pm.  We booked the earlier one.  This safari does have a few restrictions.  All guests have to be 8+ years old and in good enough health to ride this bumpy safari vehicle.  Guests who ride in an EVC can come too, they just have to leave their mobility vehicle at the resort during the safari.  Total cost ends up being $89 per person.

We hopped into our rugged safari vehicle with 2 other families and our guide.  I think there were a total of 12 guests on our ride.  The sun hadn't quite set, but darkness was quickly approaching.  We each had access to a monocular night vision device, which was REALLY COOL.  So once it got dark we had a cool green night vision to keep seeing everything around us. 

You can hold the night vision device over your camera lens to get some cool night pictures.  My phones camera isn't amazing, but I still got some great pictures and videos.  The ride is a little bumpy, but we made frequent stops to see all of the animals around us.

Our guide, Paola, gave us lots of interesting information about the Animal Kingdom grounds and about each of the animals we encountered along the way.  No you don't get to see any predator animals on this safari, we drove through a few different open sections, which would be difficult to keep the predators away from their prey. 

We saw around 20 different species of birds and large herbivores on our safari.  We even saw a Giraffe sitting down, which is a rarity.  Apparently giraffes only sleep for about a half hour a day, but broken up into sessions of a few minutes throughout the day.  So for a giraffe to sit down and rest meant they felt very safe.  It's not easy for them to sit down and get back up.

We got to learn a lot of fascinating bits about each of the animals we encountered.  This is a great experience for any animal lovers.  Our son Niko was practically jumping out of his seat with excitement.  We did get to move around inside the safari vehicle every time we stopped.  So you were always able to see the animals on either side of the vehicle.

The safari lasts about an hour.  You get to visit two of the five savannas in Animal Kingdom all from the comfort of your safari vehicle.  We even had some of the resort guests waving to us from their balconies as we drove by.  Thankfully the cool night air was much better than the heat we had been experiencing during the day.

Towards the end Paola pulled out an empty Ostrich Egg for us to examine.  All the Ostriches in Animal Kingdom are females, so they lay lots of eggs.  The resort does lots of different things with them, which are pretty funny.  Some are hard boiled and given to some of the big cats to chew on for enrichment and others are used around Easter for Holiday decoration activities.

Even hollow the egg shell was very solid and oddly textured, almost waxy feeling.

Overall a very interesting experience for anyone with an animal lover in the family.  We were fascinated by all that we learned and experienced.  We had some very close encounters with some of the wildlife.  The Starlight Safari is a great activity to add to your next Disney Adventure. Let us know how we can make that next Disney vacation just a touch more memorable.  When it's time to plan for Disney:

It's Mouse O'Clock!