Jambo from Disney’s Animal Kingdom! Join us today as we celebrate Walt Disney World’s 50th Anniversary at this beautiful park. We have been counting down the days to this celebration and cannot believe it is finally here! Disney’s Animal Kingdom had a few surprises in store for this celebration, and we’re here to take you along and show you all of them today. So let’s jump in!

Guests anxiously awaited to enter the park this morning and begin the festivities!

We spotted this all-new 50th park map featuring information about “The World’s Most Magical Celebration.” It even showcases one of DAK’s new statues, Simba!

We immediately trekked over to Creature Comforts, where we knew we’d be able to find some delicious 50th food, and they did not disappoint!

Today’s first item on our long list of new 50th food items was this 50th Anniversary Celebration Cupcake. This lemon and buttercream confection was quite the treat. To hear all of our thoughts, check out our review here!

Next up was this absolutely mouthwatering Mickey Mousse Dome Cake. This is one of the best desserts that we’ve tried at Walt Disney World in years. We didn’t want to stop eating it to write our review! But we did, so why not check it out here?

It was shaping up to be a gorgeous day!

We stopped by Drinkwallah for another sweet treat. Here we were served by some lovely Cast Members who were very excited to help guests enjoy the 50th celebration and truly make it a magical day! We want to thank all of the Cast Members who have made these parks magical over the last 50 years. You truly are the magic!

Speaking of magic, we were definitely in for an extraordinary surprise with this new Hand-Dipped 50th Celebration Mickey’s Premium Bar. The blue raspberry coating added a great twist to this classic confection, plus it’s adorable. If you want to hear about it in even more detail, check out our review.

We were venturing over to check out Disney’s Animal Kingdom’s newest show, KiteTails, when we found this cute new popcorn bucket themed around the show! This bucket features iconic characters such as Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Donald, Daisy, and Goofy. It even includes King Louie, Baloo, and Simba in their kite forms! We opted to get a taste of the new Chili-Lime Caramel Popcorn Mix to snack on while watching. Read all of our thoughts about it right here.

We found the characters of the beloved Disney classic, The Lion King, soaring through the sky during the official opening of KiteTails! Although the show had a bit of a bumpy start, we caught all of the characters safely flying along to the show’s gorgeous soundtrack today. If you haven’t seen this show take flight yet, why not watch along with us here? You can also check out The Jungle Book version of the show here.

We hopped on over to Restaurantosaurus, where we dug up some even more fantastic fare.

First up was the 50th Anniversary Celebration Milk Shake; spoiler alert, it tastes as good as it looks! The cereal and cookie topped creation was the perfect addition to this meal. But if you want to hear even more about how much we loved it, check out our review here.

Next was Walt’s Main Street Fried Chicken Sandwich. We had a few thoughts on this classic dish; to hear them all click right here. This simple cuisine was just what we needed to continue our search for sweets around the park, so let’s see what’s up next!

We ran right next door to Dino-Bite Snacks to snag this 50th Celebration Ice Cream Sandwich. This was another one of our absolute favorite dishes that we tried today. This double chocolate delight gave us the pep we needed to head back on our journey around the park.

The extinction of Primeval Whirl continues in DinoLand, U.S.A. Today we can see that even more areas of the coaster have been demolished and scrapped together in the middle of the closed attraction.

Tamu Tamu was the next stop on our snack quest!

We grabbed Scar’s Lair, which is a new twist on the iconic Disney DOLE Whip! The green apple added an extra burst of flavor to this already beloved parks staple, but we did have a few letdowns with the dish. To hear what they were, check out our full review here.

We ended up grabbing a Birthday Muffin as well. This may be on the simpler side of 50th treats, but it was still a hearty Blueberry dessert that would make for a great breakfast inside the park.

Goofy, Chip, and Dale encouraged guests to “open the door, get on the floor, everybody
walk the dinosaur!”

We set our sights for some of our last treats of the day over at Flame Tree Barbecue.

We sipped on the new EARidescent Firefly, which is definitely a drink for all of the pineapple lovers cruising around the park! Read our full review of this beautiful beverage right here.

We were a little torn on the new Smoked Meatloaf Platter. Read all of our thoughts about it in our full review if you’d like to know why!

Finally, we finished it all off with this classic gourmet cupcake. This cupcake was a Disney staple confection with vanilla and buttercream all around. It’s something that even the pickiest of eaters would be able to celebrate the 50th with. To see even more of this cupcake and its adorable design, check it out here.

We headed over to The Tree of Life, where guests were huddled around for the debut of Beacons of Magic.

The Tree of Life lit up the night sky with its all-new show in honor of Walt Disney World’s 50th Anniversary. If you didn’t get to catch it, you can watch it along with us right here!

With that, we have come to the end of Walt Disney World’s 50th Anniversary. However, this won’t be the last of the celebrations, as the parks will continue the festivities for 18 months. Of course, we’ll be here to keep you updated on all of it! Thank you so much for joining us. How did you celebrate today? Let us know in the comments below! Have a great day, everyone; we’ll “See ya real soon!”

Carmen Jordan