A Day in the Life of a Kilimajaro Safari Driver at Disney's Animal Kingdom

I have the most amazing job, I'm a Kilimanjaro Safari Driver at the Animal Kingdom at The World Famous Walt Disney World Resort. At Kilimanjaro the drivers are like one big family I love the people I work with, and I love the animals I work around. Every day is completely different... how many people can say that every day at work they see free roaming baby giraffes and nearly extinct animals like the scimitar horned oryx. Or that to you make little kids feel heroic for helping save our two most famous elephants?

Each day I wake up early to start my drive to Orlando, once I park my car I go through security. (Disney is very safe, even the employees have their bags checked) Next if it is still early enough I hop on a bike or I take the bus back to my location. Once I am clocked in it is time to do safety checks on my truck and then drive (yes, drive! we really do drive the trucks... no tracks for us!) out to the ride path. This is one of my favorite times of the day because you get a chance to chat with other drivers as we wait to open. After we open and the honorary family has started their safari the real fun begins, I love doing safaris in the morning because everyone is excited as I am. Each morning my first safari is exciting to me because I don't know where the animals are because they are free roaming so I get excited when I spot them. After a few rounds I get a general idea of where the animals are until they move again and then the day starts to slow down, we have AC but its not very good and it can get quite hot, so I am usually happy to go on breaks and lunch.

Breaks and Lunches are a lot of fun because like I said before, I love the people I work with! I work with all kinds of people and all different ages, there are also the interns in the college program and the international program so it is fun to meet people from around the world. My favorite was a guy from Australia. If I am lucky I get a "land" position later in the day so I can interact with guests on a more personal level. (A land position is the people you see through out the queue line and loading docks, every one drives and everyone does lands) Lands are a nice break from driving because driving a 30 foot truck can be tiresome at times and it is fun to see the guests enjoying themselves.

As the day goes on more safari's go by and then it is closing time and the animals go in and the trucks get checked back in. And it is time to go home to do it again the next day. After work it is fun to look back on the days events and also just to hang out with other drivers.