tandcmum
21-10-05, 21:52
DAY 1- Sunday 18th September
CAST
Me (30), Dave (33) Thomas (3 nearly 4) Charlotte (1 nearly 2)
3am and my alarm is going off, amazingly I went to bed at 10.30pm last night and actually slept solidly until now, but that was probably due to not sleeping properly for at least the last week. Anyway I instantly put the lamp on but didn’t get up straight away. It wasn’t that I wasn’t keen to get going but I kinda enjoyed the 20 mins alone with my thoughts. I have wanted to go to Florida ever since I went as a 12 year old, and today it was finally happening. We have had quite a rough year this year and last so it was also well deserved.
I finally dragged myself out of my bed at 3.30am and got myself dressed and sorted before starting the mass lights on and out of your bed routine. Everybody actually got up pretty briskly and after dressing the kids, final check on the documents and finish piling everything and everyone into the car we set of to Edinburgh at 4.30am.
Arrived at the offsite parking at 5am dot on time, unloaded and loaded the bags and we were off to the airport. I think we got there about 5.30am and got checked in straight away. Edinburgh isn’t a huge airport so we pretty much went straight through to the departure lounge where we had Costa coffee and muffins, whilst the kids ran around and looked out the windows at the planes. Boarded our BA flight to LGW and we were away on time at 6.35am. Flight was almost empty so we had a row of 3 either side. A hot breakfast was served which was very nice. It always makes me laugh watching these poor cabin crew trying to get a full breakfast out on these short flights, the plane is barely off the runway before they start and they are usually just putting the last dishes away as the wheels hit the tarmac again. Kids were pretty good although Charlotte was a bit unsettled towards the end, not a good thing when we have another 9 and half hours flight ahead of us. Thomas got talking to another little boy who was about the same age as him, it turned out they were also on the same flight as us to Orlando.
Arrived at LGW and did bag drop with no problems as we had done online check in the day before. Had a look around the shops in ‘the village’ then we decided to let the kids loose in the padded cell ,well it’s actually supposed to be a play area but if anyone else has ever used it you’ll know what I mean. It’s down a long corridor which only leads to the toilets and is basically just a room that has loads of padding on the walls and floors with a few padded shapes. We let the kids blow off some steam in here for about 30 mins whilst we sat and watched them. We then went through to the departure lounge as I was due to meet Jules (signtalker) and Marie (mariechez) at 10.45. Once we got through we decided to get the kids some fries from McD’s (the first of many healthy meals..LOL), I sat with Charlotte while Dave and Thomas fought to get some food. 25 mins later they appeared looking harassed, and by this time I was 10 mins late for my meet up, but I went along anyway. On getting to the duty free shop I couldn’t see anyone resembling Jules and marie (not that I had any idea who I was looking for in the first place!) so I hung around for a few minutes and lo and behold two people looking like they were going to Disney appeared and we all said our hellos, chatted for a few minutes before I went and returned to an even more harassed looking Dave (kids were okay though!!!)
We headed up to gate 33 where we saw Jersey Girl parked ready for us. We let the kids run around a bit in the hope that they would then be quiet for the flight, and I attacked them with an elephant tranquiliser, well according to Mariechez I did (they were watching and laughing at me chasing the kids round!!) actually it was one of those syringes you get with children’s nurofen and contained medised for Charlotte and Phenergan for Thomas (okay I’ve got my flame proof suit on if you want to comment on me drugging up my kids, but it wasn’t a sedative dose it was a travel sickness one, and as my two hadn’t done a long haul flight before I decided not risk the plane furnishings!!) We waited until pretty much last to board the plane, which was fine as it meant we didn’t have long to wait until we took off.
http://www.thedibb.co.uk/photopost/data/500/4187WDW05_photos_002.jpg
Flight was fine, we had seats 22 DEFG, which get slated as being terrible on V-flyer but we were really pleased with them. Kids slept from take off until the meal came round which gave us a nice break. Meals were good, kids had chicken teddies with mash and carrots, and loads of little packs of goodies and treats to keep them occupied. I had the beef stew and Dave had the chicken, no complaints on the food front. Dave watched quite a lot of the TV, I think I watched a bit of friends and that was all as I seemed to end up with the job of entertaining the kids (thanks Dave!), kids watched Finding nemo and the V tots channel which went down well. I had also wrapped up some little gifts for them which I gave to them periodically. It was only in the last couple of hours that the kids got rather fractious. To be honest I don’t blame them, I was also getting rather tired and fed up. The seat belt sign for landing went on ridiculously early and the kids were not happy at being restrained, and pretty much screamed for the last half hour of the flight until we landed (sorry everyone else on our flight). We landed at 16.30 and the captain announced it was 94 degrees, nice!!!
Immigration was fine, we actually got off pretty much first so we were first in the line, we did the pick up drop off pick up bag thing and met our driver from Quicksilver and we were off (after being completely knocked off our feet by the intense heat as we walked out of the airport terminal) we stopped at Publix for milk, cereals, coke and a few snacks and then onto Port Orleans French Quarter. We were pretty impressed with the resort on entering the lobby, but check in was very slow and took us over 30 mins to even get served. They originally had us in building 1, which I wasn’t happy with but when I mentioned we had 2 continuing reservations thay had to change us so we didn’t have to move rooms and we got building 5 which we had requested. On finding our room we were actually overlooking the pool, and were in the middle of a corrider, one end the steps led to the pool, the other end we were straight into the food court. Perfect. Room was lovely and we got our bags from bell services and unpacked whilst we waited for a pizza to be delivered. Threw the kids into the bath and into their beds. I went down to the food court and had a quick nosy around the resort, bought some refillable mugs and filled them with hot chocolate, we had those then we were asleep by 10pm.
http://www.thedibb.co.uk/photopost/data/504/4187WDW05_photos_186.jpg
CAST
Me (30), Dave (33) Thomas (3 nearly 4) Charlotte (1 nearly 2)
3am and my alarm is going off, amazingly I went to bed at 10.30pm last night and actually slept solidly until now, but that was probably due to not sleeping properly for at least the last week. Anyway I instantly put the lamp on but didn’t get up straight away. It wasn’t that I wasn’t keen to get going but I kinda enjoyed the 20 mins alone with my thoughts. I have wanted to go to Florida ever since I went as a 12 year old, and today it was finally happening. We have had quite a rough year this year and last so it was also well deserved.
I finally dragged myself out of my bed at 3.30am and got myself dressed and sorted before starting the mass lights on and out of your bed routine. Everybody actually got up pretty briskly and after dressing the kids, final check on the documents and finish piling everything and everyone into the car we set of to Edinburgh at 4.30am.
Arrived at the offsite parking at 5am dot on time, unloaded and loaded the bags and we were off to the airport. I think we got there about 5.30am and got checked in straight away. Edinburgh isn’t a huge airport so we pretty much went straight through to the departure lounge where we had Costa coffee and muffins, whilst the kids ran around and looked out the windows at the planes. Boarded our BA flight to LGW and we were away on time at 6.35am. Flight was almost empty so we had a row of 3 either side. A hot breakfast was served which was very nice. It always makes me laugh watching these poor cabin crew trying to get a full breakfast out on these short flights, the plane is barely off the runway before they start and they are usually just putting the last dishes away as the wheels hit the tarmac again. Kids were pretty good although Charlotte was a bit unsettled towards the end, not a good thing when we have another 9 and half hours flight ahead of us. Thomas got talking to another little boy who was about the same age as him, it turned out they were also on the same flight as us to Orlando.
Arrived at LGW and did bag drop with no problems as we had done online check in the day before. Had a look around the shops in ‘the village’ then we decided to let the kids loose in the padded cell ,well it’s actually supposed to be a play area but if anyone else has ever used it you’ll know what I mean. It’s down a long corridor which only leads to the toilets and is basically just a room that has loads of padding on the walls and floors with a few padded shapes. We let the kids blow off some steam in here for about 30 mins whilst we sat and watched them. We then went through to the departure lounge as I was due to meet Jules (signtalker) and Marie (mariechez) at 10.45. Once we got through we decided to get the kids some fries from McD’s (the first of many healthy meals..LOL), I sat with Charlotte while Dave and Thomas fought to get some food. 25 mins later they appeared looking harassed, and by this time I was 10 mins late for my meet up, but I went along anyway. On getting to the duty free shop I couldn’t see anyone resembling Jules and marie (not that I had any idea who I was looking for in the first place!) so I hung around for a few minutes and lo and behold two people looking like they were going to Disney appeared and we all said our hellos, chatted for a few minutes before I went and returned to an even more harassed looking Dave (kids were okay though!!!)
We headed up to gate 33 where we saw Jersey Girl parked ready for us. We let the kids run around a bit in the hope that they would then be quiet for the flight, and I attacked them with an elephant tranquiliser, well according to Mariechez I did (they were watching and laughing at me chasing the kids round!!) actually it was one of those syringes you get with children’s nurofen and contained medised for Charlotte and Phenergan for Thomas (okay I’ve got my flame proof suit on if you want to comment on me drugging up my kids, but it wasn’t a sedative dose it was a travel sickness one, and as my two hadn’t done a long haul flight before I decided not risk the plane furnishings!!) We waited until pretty much last to board the plane, which was fine as it meant we didn’t have long to wait until we took off.
http://www.thedibb.co.uk/photopost/data/500/4187WDW05_photos_002.jpg
Flight was fine, we had seats 22 DEFG, which get slated as being terrible on V-flyer but we were really pleased with them. Kids slept from take off until the meal came round which gave us a nice break. Meals were good, kids had chicken teddies with mash and carrots, and loads of little packs of goodies and treats to keep them occupied. I had the beef stew and Dave had the chicken, no complaints on the food front. Dave watched quite a lot of the TV, I think I watched a bit of friends and that was all as I seemed to end up with the job of entertaining the kids (thanks Dave!), kids watched Finding nemo and the V tots channel which went down well. I had also wrapped up some little gifts for them which I gave to them periodically. It was only in the last couple of hours that the kids got rather fractious. To be honest I don’t blame them, I was also getting rather tired and fed up. The seat belt sign for landing went on ridiculously early and the kids were not happy at being restrained, and pretty much screamed for the last half hour of the flight until we landed (sorry everyone else on our flight). We landed at 16.30 and the captain announced it was 94 degrees, nice!!!
Immigration was fine, we actually got off pretty much first so we were first in the line, we did the pick up drop off pick up bag thing and met our driver from Quicksilver and we were off (after being completely knocked off our feet by the intense heat as we walked out of the airport terminal) we stopped at Publix for milk, cereals, coke and a few snacks and then onto Port Orleans French Quarter. We were pretty impressed with the resort on entering the lobby, but check in was very slow and took us over 30 mins to even get served. They originally had us in building 1, which I wasn’t happy with but when I mentioned we had 2 continuing reservations thay had to change us so we didn’t have to move rooms and we got building 5 which we had requested. On finding our room we were actually overlooking the pool, and were in the middle of a corrider, one end the steps led to the pool, the other end we were straight into the food court. Perfect. Room was lovely and we got our bags from bell services and unpacked whilst we waited for a pizza to be delivered. Threw the kids into the bath and into their beds. I went down to the food court and had a quick nosy around the resort, bought some refillable mugs and filled them with hot chocolate, we had those then we were asleep by 10pm.
http://www.thedibb.co.uk/photopost/data/504/4187WDW05_photos_186.jpg