Thursday February 6th 2025

Late last year Disney announced the birth of a tiger cub at the Animal Kingdom. Last week the cub and its mother made their first appearance in the tiger compound along the Maharajah Jungle Trek. Today I got my first look at the new resident.

I actually got lucky. According to the cast member stationed near the viewing area the tigers were scheduled to return back stage for the day at 2PM, but the cub had other ideas. It was still playing a good distance from the back stage entrance at 2:30 despite several attempts by its mother to encourage it in. Mom clearly knew the drill and wanted its offspring to follow her. She would leave the cub and head for the hidden door only to sprint back to the cub a minute or two later when it didn’t follow. A little bit of nudging and prodding followed before mom would try again. Eventually the cub followed.

People were lined up four and five deep at the tiger viewing area. I could see the tigers by looking over and around people, but it was difficult to take pictures. The added distance from the fence resulted in the cell phone camera auto focusing on the fence instead of the animals. When I was done, I had more out of focus than in focus shots. At least digital pictures are cheaper than film pictures and can be cleaned up a bit later.

Of course I had to ride the Kilimanjaro Safari while at Animal Kingdom. It was a fun experience as usual, but there didn’t seem to be as many animals out in the open as there were last week. In particular, the elephants weren’t hiding at the back of their area, making them hard to see.

Earlier in the week I made another stop at EPCOT. My specific purpose was to get some Fish and Chips at the Yorkshire County Fish Shop for dinner, but another viewing of all the art displays was a great experience as well. The absence of rain for a few days allowed the chalk art artists to fill the designated walkways with drawings. I was beginning to wonder if they were going to complete the displays this year.