Jewel

Daughter has written this for her English homework, and I know I'm biased but I think it's pretty darned good! Enjoy :-)

"I am here today to tell you of a magnificent jewel, a natural beauty, found within the depths of the Scared Jungle. Many believe that this exceedinly rare treasure was left to us by the Greek goddess Tamra. But by the touch of a finger, this iridescent jewel will ingite its wicked powers!

It all began when a young traveller, whose name is unknown, began his journey in search of treasure. Hiking up a vast mountain he was surrounded by a thick, eerie mist; he stumbled and came upon a cave which seemed to draw him in. As if transfixed the traveller made his way steadily through the tunnels of caves, until at last he stopped just outside an arch-like entrance...

After a few minutes he began stumbling on as if he knew the secret tunnels like the back of his hand. Just then a strong wind pushed him back, his scruffy hair flowing behind him....the fire-lit torches never flickered. A luminous light shone from in front, then a glassy shimmer caught his bright, blue dancing eyes. The jewel was crescent-shaped, like the moon in the dark, night sky.

Its ruby red colour seemed to be a vivid fire in which a polished ruby lay - the finest quality! The man reached out one shaking hand to greedily clasp the fragile jewel, but as soon as he flet the coldness upon his hand his heart stopped pumping and he fell to the ground, motionless.

Yet another victim. Who would be next?"

The day we hit Downtown Disney to eat, shop and play

We breakfasted on Bob Evans 'biscuits' or toast and some 'jelly' or peanut butter at the villa. It took us a while to get going so we decided to veer from my plan of Wet n Wild or a park this afternoon and devote the whole day to Downtown Disney.

We had an ADR for T Rex restaurant at DTD for 11am (which wasn't really needed as it opened at 11am and there was only a short queue).

I was very pleased to make the acquaintance of Manny, from one of my fave films, in there


and even more pleased with my Tar Pit Shrimp meal. I just love shrimp!


I thought the meteor shower was over-rated, or else I'd hyped it up in my own mind!

The kids loved the theming and their cameras were both out in an instant.

We grabbed our server for a family shot too:

The lighting in that restaurant is terrible, it really is!

Here's Lee's $25 platter!!


Gotta be a carnivore to eat that lot! Lucky he was hungry, as was this fella...



We paid a spur of the moment trip into Disneyquest which the kids enjoyed but I thought was far too hot, crowded and noisy for my likeing. We stayed for 2 hours though and I must admit to enjoying a go on Guitar Hero! Here's me, the ageing rocker..



and my younger, more attractive sidekick :-)


While we mastered one of our fave songs by Coldplay the boys shared a game:



We strolled across Pleasure Island commenting on how little of it we remembered other than that we went into the Comedy Warehouse, and although we saw a Comedy warehouse logo on the side of a buidling none of the area looked familiar. But hey, it was 17 years ago that we were last there!

Characters in Flight:
Up, up and away...












The Lego shop over in the Marketplace was next stop. Katie filled a cup with as much as she could cram in.....after spending a good half an hour deciding which pieces she wanted! The choice was overwhelming...








Despite being a long-standing and massive Lego fan I didn't buy a single piece, although I did try to interfere with what Katie chose to put in her fill-your-own pot, while Lee was chief advisor on how to squueze as much into that pot as possible by strategically placing certain shaped pieces in the tiny lip around the bottom of the pot :-)

We also had a leisurely stroll over to the other end of the Marketplace in search of a belt stall from which Lee had bought a nice leather belt and buckle 17 years ago. There was still such a stall, who'd have thought it! A few evenings later Lee got chatting to the man on the stall while choosing a new belt and buckle (he still has the first one but his waist has expanded somewhat since 1992!), a very friendly Pole, who, while making the belts to size, managed to tell us his entire life story, but he was a nice guy and we were interested. This took some time, and in the end the kids and I sauntered off to rest our tired bods on a wall where I took the opportunity to play with my new camera...again :-)

But I digress, back to that afternoon.... We popped into the Under $10 store, my goodness is that place unbearable! No air-con and packed with kids and grumpy parents! I did however find two Disney punches for my scrapbooking stash! The stuffiness of this store finished us off and we were soon on our way back to the car and the villa.

Here's a few of my fave photos from around DTD:











After a rest at the villa we headed off for some mini-golf at Jungle Golf , Formosa Gardens on the 192 .This place seemed very new, and was very well flood light for late night golfing. I think it cost about $8 each, that may been expensive for mini-golf, I'm not sure, it's the only one we visited, but we enjoyed it anyway, for its fun and newness.

As we arrived the sky came over very dark and there was a gorgeous rainbow and fortunately the heavens didn't open while we played...















We had planned on dinner in a restaurant but we were tired and just grabbed a McDonald's drive thru (still, quite a feast given the U.S. portion sizes!)then it was back to the villa for some zzzs

The Day Sam turned 16

We woke a little earlier today so decided to eat at the park. Today was Hollywood Studios day. As it was Sam's 16th birthday this seemed a good place to go, having rides associated with films that Sam has enjoyed in years gone by (Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Honey I Shrunk the Kids) as well as some exciting rides like the Tower of Terror and the Rock n Roller Coaster.

Sam had most of his birthday cards the day before we flew as there didn't seem any point in taking cards along with us, apart from one from ourselves. We did take one present along, but just one as Sam wanted money this year. After he'd opened his present, a new digital camera, we made it to rope drop again and picked up from the Will Call window a $79 Fun Card for our birthday boy (yes! It had gone up from $75 to $79 LOL!) and a birthday badge. The card coud be spent in any Disney store, even here in England, and had no expiry date (not that the latter was a problem as we spent it at Downtown Disney a few days later! There wasn't much Sam actually wanted, other than a huge Mickey Mouse soft toy for $19.99 so we used it on gifts and memories). The birthday badge made the day special, Sam got alot of birthday greetings from cast members which was nice.

Bloomin' good, my new camera, here's a snap of Sam bearing badges mid sneeze....no camera shake or blur with this camera, and a totally unintentional shot!


We headed for the Rock n Roller Coaster first, along with some other early starters, but laughed at the ones who ran ahead...it was hot already, and we weren't running anywhere!

What luck, it was a walk-on! No queue at all, only in the rows next to the car you board for the ride! No wait, no chance for me to be afraid! Sam and I were a little scared but determined to say we had ridden. We hopped into a car, behind Lee and Katie, and started to chant the countdown excitedly, oh my, the acceleration was terrifying, it took my breath away and I had to force myself to open my eyes after a few seconds! There were a few hairy moments out there in the dark, twisting and turning, including a moment when, midride, I doubted that I had anchored my camera and bag to my leg with the straps as I felt them lift of the floor at one point!!

After a mixture of screams and laughter we emerged triumphant, we had survived a 'big' ride! I was so proud of myself I forgot to take a photo of the outside of the ride but here's one of our next stop...cue scary music...do-do-do-dooo do-do-do-dooo (Twilight Zone, just in case you're wondering!)



Here we picked up a fastpass each because the standby time was over 30 minutes already. We filled the time until our return time with some breakfast and a spot in the shade at Starring Rolls Cafe, Star Tours and Muppet Vision 3D (both were walk-ons).







I think I'll stick with my own glasses thanks!

We returned to the Tower of Terror, terrified, at 10.50 and again had no more than a few minutes wait. The anticipation for this one was almost unbearable, I'm not keen on heights nor that feeling when you lose your stomach in a big drop. I was grateful to be at the edge of the elevator when we got seated as I got the extra handle, which I clung to with my clammy hand until it ached! I began to concentrate on controlling my breathing and 'lost the plot' of the pre-ride journey through the hotel, and we were soon into our first drop! Oh my goodness, I still can't describe the motion! I felt something like a baby must feel in a baby bouncer that hangs from a doorway, only much worse! I hunched my stomach forwards and that seemed to help somehow. I couldn't decide if it was better to look out of those doors as they opened to show how high up we were over the park, or whether it was better to keep my eyes tight shut! It was certainly thrilling and I now understand why you can hear so many screams from outside the tower - I know that I wasn't the only one screamin in the elevator!


Can you spot us? Look at Katie, such a brave soul!!
High five! I'd survived another big ride! I would even go so far as to say I enjoyed it, well, the feeling afterwards at least! Lee, Sam and Katie definitely enjoyed it, although Sam didn't want to ride again (me neither!). My enjoyment defintiely stemmed from the sense of achievement I felt in having ridden.

We grabbed some lunch in the Backlot Express while we waited for the Indiana Jones show and made the most of the airconditioning and some icy water from our bottles. By this time Sam was struggling with the heat (he hadn't chosen a white T Shirt today!) but he decided to stay for the Indie show.

We all enjoyed the stunt spectacular, especially Lee and I, shice we remembered this from our honeymoon in 1992 and it didn't appear to have changed much.

When we arrived home I read that someone had died in this show (I think it was during a rehersal), whether it was anyone from this photo I don't know. Very sad though.


We then headed towards the park entrance, walking thorugh the shops for a browse and to benefit form the air-con again. We were grateful that we chose a villa with a pool that afternoon and spent a couple of hours in and around it recovering from the heat. Here are my water babies...another chance to play with my camera :-)







Our plan was to return to HS as we still had our Toy Story Mania fastpasses that we had picked up and had also fogotten to visit the Backlot Tour and Magic of Disney Animation however the skies greyed over and the rain started. No of us fancied going out in it, this was no short shower, it went on and on, and got heavier and heavier, accompanied by loud claps of thunder and lightening. Nevertheless, aware that we only had so many days in which to conquer all that we wanted to see, we decided to make our way back to HS in the hope that it would pass over. Our journey up the US 27, along the 192 and onto World Drive was unbelieveable. The windscreen wipers were at their fastest and we could barely see!

Thus far we hadn't used the Sherbeth Road shortcut that I'd learnt about here on the Dibb, but eventually I spotted signs for it and it came in handy as the 192 seemed quite busy in the evenings. It took more than 2 or 3 trips back to the villa before I finally figured out how to use the shortcut in reverse (tip - to get back to the 192 from Epcot, MK or HS follow sings for AK and then for AK Lodge where the road splits for AK and the AK Lodge otherwise you end up in the AK parking lot!)

On arrival at HS's parking lot the rain was still torrential and the lightening hadn't stopped. We, along with some other families, sat in the car for about 25 minutes an eventually decided to leg it to the tram and not worry about getting wet clothes and trainers.



We sloshed our way over to Toy Story Mania and used our fast passes (glad we had them, the wait was for almost 2 hours by then and there were no fast passes left!).
Even with our fastpasses there was a wait of about 25 minutes. This ride was fun with a capital F! We adored it! Lee got a score of 116000, Sam got over 100000 too, Katie and I managed 89000 and 96000, but the scores didn't matter, it was such good fun! Some scores onthe board when we got off were around 260000 so we clearly needed more practice and I wished I had read up on how to get good scores in my Julie and Mike Neal book, The Complete Walt Disney World 2009 (page 191 if you have the book too)!

We headed to the Backlot Tour but it had stopped running because of the weather. We hung around for 15 mins until almost 6.30pm and with lightening still in the area and the ride due to officially close at 7pm we gave up and decided to come back another day. Instead, we did the first part of the Magic of Disney Animation, It was a half hour wait and I was really tired but glad I stuck around, I really loved the show with the cast memeber and Mishu interacting. I coudl have sat and watched this show over and over. Katie and Sam wanted to do the animation class but there was another 20 minute queue for it so we called it a day, hoping for a shorter line next time.

We headed back to the 192 to find somwhere to eat and decided on Bob Evans. This place was a hit from the moment we walked in, form the cleanliness and friendliness to the American biscuit with apple butter and the menu choice (later in my trip report you'll see we changed our mind about how wonderful Bob Evans was, but that's another story!) Cranberry, walnut and chicken slad for me, Chef's salad for Lee, southern fried chicken with mash and veg for Katie, and turkey, mash and breadcrumb and celery stuffing with gravy for Sam. The gravy is somewhat different to good old Bisto though! And the mash...well, if you like Smash you'd be just fine an dandy :-)






How me and Lee loved the American 'biscuits'! Our server was great and gave us two extra in a box to take away with us. He was very friendly, telling us all about his knowledge of what us Brits eat and enjoy, and about his home grown veggies!

After dinner we went to Walmart at Cagan's Crossing where Sam and Lee looked at tools and electronics and me and Katie spend many happy minutes marvelling at the scrapbooking section and prices, popping more an a couple of items into our trolley! I'm quite new to scrapbooking and thus far have only bought from a couple of online stores and ebay. Walmart, without a doubt, worked out cheaper! Sadly there were no Disney scrap items, but a whole load of lovely letterings and stickers, as well as nice albums and papers.

Another day done and dusted, back to the villa we went, content with our lot.

The Day we did Epcot (continued!)

Despite Katie being desperate for a swim in the villa's pool we decided not to chance it - there was some serious thunder and lightening... something we grew used to over the fortnight! On this occasion it lasted until after dark. Instead we chilled and drove out to Cracker Barrel on the 192 for a late dinner (I was so tired I really couldn't face food and I think my tiredness jaded my opinion of the Cracker Barrel). The rain on the way was unbelievably torrential! I'd read about how some drivers pull over as you can't see further than a few feet and it really was like that! Lee chose not to pull over though, he thought that would be more dangerous in case someone ploughed into the back of our car, so we drove on, albeit it extremely slowly. I captured the rain, and a rather fantastic streak of lightening as we drove along the US 27 (I'll see if I can upload that at some point, something else to learn how to do).

At Cracker Barrel Lee opted for a light salad, as did I. When the server asked what dressing we wanted we were overwhelmed with a choice! At home it's mayonnaise or salad cream, here it's blue cheese, ranch, honey and mustard plus others I can't remember! Lee opted for ranch on the side, in case he didn't like it, while I had none. He thought ranch dressing was "ok".




(I didn't note down what the kids had, but a common theme is chicken nuggets or breast and fries!)

It was packed, it took a while to get a table, but we mooched around their shop while we waited and picked up some Gillian Candy Sticks in lots of delicious flavours, like root beer (I'm a big root beer fan!) and cherry. I think 10 sticks only cost about £1! Sam also bought himself a harmonica for $5 Sadly the sticks have long been gobbled up but I'll be getting more, by hook or by crook, so yummy were they!

We had no room for dessert (another common theme this holiday, meal sizes are so big we never had appetizers, except for on arrival day when we didn't know better, or puddings!) and headed back to the villa, pooped and ready for some sleep!

The Day we did Epcot

12th August 2009

We were up just after 6am without the alarm clock. We grabbed breakfast at the Golden Corral on the 192 - a delicious buffet where you eat whatever you want, including cake! I stuck to some fresh fruit, bacon (don't expect alot of meat on your bacon, it's very streaky!), egg and grated potatoes (hash browns?) Katie had fresh fruit and a pancake, but she wasn't keen on this pancake!




We were at Epcot for our first ever ropedrop (along with hundreds of other early risers it seemed!) and could only see the tops of a few characters heads!

Soarin' was first (this girl did her planning on the Dibb and in her Orlando books that numbered more than five, we were hitting the most popular rides first!). No big queue, just a few minutes wait. We all loved Soarin. As I sat in my chair high above the Golden Gate Bridge I took a moment to think...I was elated, I was here, I was in America, the land of so much beauty, and I was determined that once this holiday was done I'd start saving for another holiday somewhere else in America! (sorry, gushy moment, but I was quite awestruck!)

Next up was Test Track, only a ten minute queue by this time, lots to look at inteh queue



again we loved it, although the rapid acceleration had my heart pumping for a few moments there! (I'm not a big coaster fan as you will find out later if you count the number of big coasters that I actually rode on holiday!)

Mission Space was next on my plan - the green option! As we entered the building I couldn't believe what I saw and heard from another guest....a mother her child (maybe 8 years old) by the arm and the child was protesting that he didn't want to ride the orange version yet she yanked him along saying that [I]she[/I] did! The poor kid!

Getting to rope drop had been a good plan, we now had 3 major rides done in the first hour!

Ellen's Energy Adventure gave our feet a rest, I enjoyed it, but then I think she's funny and I follow her on Twitter.

Spaceship Earth was to be next but we skipped it as the queue was winding around outside. We cme back to this at the end of our day when there was no queue outside. When we did ride the kids enjoyed the interactive computer screens on the way back down and although we tried to email the images back home at the end of the ride the emails haven't arrived. Luckily I captured Lee and Katie's images on my camera as they popped up on screens inside the buidling




The kids were hot and struggling by now so we skipped Innoventions and The Seas and headed for the Yorkshire County Fish Shop we were managed to find an umbrella to sit under with a view over Epcot's lagoon.

We'd bought with us bottles of frozen water in a small cool bag, look how much of Katie's was already gone and melted by this time:




A slow walk around World Showcase followed,








as far as Germany, followed by a much needed slushie. I recommend the raspberry or cherry ones for a bright coloured tongue for ages afterwards!



Tired (everyone more so than I!) we decided to hop onto the boat back to Mexico, I did want to wander among the different buidlings but one has to go with the majority :) The boat ride was pleasant and I took the opportunity to snap away with my new camera.











We headed for another ride next, not far from our landing place, Maelstrom, and then the Gran Fiesta Tour, which although not as exciting as our first few rides were worth a short wait.

We decided to call it a day at this point and popped into Guest Relations because I'd forgotten to get the kids their free First Visit badges. It was here that our magical moment of the day (I have a Passporter book and there's a line in which you comment on your most magical moment) occured. A man came in and gave Lee four fast passes for Soarin as me and the kids were talking to the cast member behind the counter about our ride on Soarin earlier and while he gave the kids tips on what to look out for, including the hidden Mickey, which we hadn't spotted. We were chuffed to bits (especially me, remember the effect this very first ride had on me? :)) and decided to use them. For anyone who doesn't know what a fast pass is, it's a pass that you get from a machine that allows you to go back to a ride within a certain time period and join a shorter queue, and given that some queues can be as long as 2 hours they are really worth having! We had about a 45 minute wait for the fast pass return time so we visited Club Cool, the place where you get free samples of drinks from different countries (the two on the right were my faves, China was one of them I think)




We also rode Journey Into Imagination with Figment (I loved the catchy tune!) and Honey I Shrunk the Audience (a hit with all of us).

Soarin was just as good second time around, if not better, because we spotted the hidden Mickey and some other small details pointed out by the Guest Relations guys earlier.

We left the park on a high note.

Continued...(I'll try to be quicker with the update than last time!)

The dream vacation, departure day.

My first ever trip report, hope someone enjoys it as much as I've enjoyed writing it!

Travellers:
me, Tina, 40 (Disneyland, Ca. 1980, WDW honeymoon 1992, Disneyland Paris (DLP) 2002)
hub, Lee, 41 (WDW honeymoon 1992, DLP 2002)
son, Sam, 16 (DLP 2002)
daughter, Katie, 12 (DLP 2002)

So, as you can see, our first trip to Florida as a family, and one I've been wanting to do for years!

Let's dive straight in....

The day we headed off on my dream holiday

August 11th 4.30am

Katie was first out of bed this morning at just beofre 4am, bouncing like a caffeinated Tigger. Glad to see excitement has finally kicked in, thus far no one has wanted to share my 10 month-long excitement! A quick cuppa, washed up, dressed (don't panic, we all showered last night!), checked passports were in my bag, locked up, checked passports were in my bag again, and off we went to Gatwick. The M25 was dominated by lorries, but pretty quiet compared to previous trips.

We navigated easily to the Summer Special long stay parking lot (sorry, I've bought an Americanisation home with me, I mean car park of course!) only to find that buses were only running to the North terminal so we'd have to catch the monorail thingy to the south terminal for our flight. Not a problem though, we'd done it before and it's no bother.

Finding the Thomas Cook check in was painless, as was the queue...there wasn't one, or at least not a winding snake one, just two families ahead of us. Excellent start!

Having handed over our 2 wheely bags we were directed upstairs for the security check. I'd read about this here on the Dibb but had forgotten its existence. Thanking the guy who directed us there we were through in minutes, again, no queue (don't worry, you'll hear much more about queues from Day 1 onwards) For a change it was Katie who was stopped for a 'frisk' (I wonder what the formal name for this procedure is called?) not me. I thought they were very good with her, she's only 12 and at that age as we all know rather sensitive! After a few questions, such as "who are you travelling with, where are you going, how old are you", followed a "well done" which I thought was a nice touch, we were all through and tackled the pile of belts and bags.

Upstairs we discovered Frankie and Benny's for breakfast. Our normal haunt is Garfunkels but we were more impressed with F&B's. I chose fruit salad (far to early, my stomach hadn't woken up and I couldn't face much other than a coffee), Katie had a New England with pancakes (she loved them - I can guess what she'll be choosing for breakfasts in the U.S.!) and my boys had traditional fry-ups.
Sorry, no photos of this dining event, I was so tired and preoccupied with travelling arrangements that I didn't think to get the camera out of my bag until we arrived at the villa some 12 hours later.

We had plenty of time to kill so we wandered around HMV (and for the first time ever left with nothing other than our kids!) and WHSMith for the compulsory water for the flight and reading material - newspaper and magazines. This year, in an effort to save extra pennies Katie and I (the avid readers of the family) had raided charity bookshops in advance for our holiday books and had some good bargains. On this particular trip I took as many books as I would for a beach-style holiday (i.e. one in my hand luggage and 3 in my hold luggage) but I totally underestimated how little time there would be for reading on a Disney holiday!! I read half of the thinnest book that I took :-) Any time I did have at the end of each park day was spent half asleep on the sofa uploading the day's photos to my EeePC before falling into bed within an hour of coming home from the park.

Then followed a sleepy hour's wait for our flight to move up the board and appear with a gate number. Apart from the flight home this was one of the worst parts of the travelling...I'm not good when I'm tired, I suffer with twitchy legs and feel nauseous, and usually have, ahem, a few nervous excitement trips to the loo! This time was worse than usual and I resorted to two Immodium Instants! Moving swiftly on.... ;-)

No delays on the board, hurrah! More or less on time popped up Gate 23, off we strolled, no hurry, I'd forked out for pre-booked seats. A far cry from our experiences with Easyjet where everyone is desperate to be near the front desk in the departure lounge regardless or not whether those in wheelchairs or with small children are called for first! I liken it to verging on a rugby scrum, except there are suitcases involved because no one particularly wants to fork out for hold luggage if they can get away with it.

We boarded about half an hour late. During this time I was glancing around trying to spot fellow Dibber Helen or any other Dibbers (the Dibb is a very useful and friendly forum for anyone wanting to find out about, or share information about Florida and all things Disney World). It turns out that during the whole 2 weeks I never spotted one Dibber car sticker, badge, cap or lanyard...but then, I didn't wear any Dibb merchandise either.

Premium rows were called first, rows 1 to 7 I think, "we'll be next" we thought, being in rows 11 and 12, but no, after premium travellers came those from the very back of the plane. We were actually the very last family to board, Lee having been subjected to a randomly selected frisk and final bag check in the departure lounge (something we've never encountered before).

10am All board! First impressions....legroom - plenty of it! We sat in twos, by the window, the kids in front of us. Their main concern was which stranger would be sitting in the aisle seat next to them, but as it turned out, there was no one...until the lady next to us had to move forward because her TV didn't work, but she was a nice lady with children of her own so Sam and Katie's fears were abated.

I passed the first two hours working out how to use the TV, napping uncomfortably (I envy those hardy travellers who can sleep upright!), starting this trip report and also caught half fo He's Just Not Into You (I didn't realise you couldn't choose when to start your film, and there was no indication from the crew as to when it started) which I really enjoyed despite heavy eyes.

Lunch arrived after the drink/snack trolley (which we didn't need, we had our own sweeties and water). It, the lunch, smelt delicious and wasn't at all bad - beef provencial I think they called it...stew with peas and potatoes to me! Also 2 crackers, a roll, some disgusting spread, marg, caesar pasta with some parmesan, and a treacle/syrup pudding. Between the 4 of us we did some swopping and all had enough of what we liked. Coffe, tea or squash followed. Thumbs up Thomas Cook Airlines, we were content.

I tried again to nap after testing the downstairs toilet (tip - busy after drinks trolley and meals!), interrupted by occasional questions from my nearest and dearest , a mini cornetto and the arrival of the green visa waiver forms. At this point Lee was fast asleep so I filled in all four (after messing up one!)

I asked for a pillow and blanket, having spotted that others had them, as window seats leave you with one cold arm and leg! By now we are half way across the ocean...only some four and a half hours to go!



.....6.20pm Uk time, 1 hour to go! Second meal arrived - pasta bows in tomato and herb sauce, a Time Out bar and a coffee. Poor Lee, pasta again, he hates the stuff, so I angelically swopped my Time Out (do you realise what a big deal this is...I haven't had chocolate for 9 weeks!) for his pasta.

Passed some time reading the newspaper and on my DS Lite while Katie also read, and Sam and Lee played chess and checkers on DS Download Play...both Lee and I gave up on our iPods (Lee had bought Top Gear from iTunes and I had a Jodi Picoult audiobook I had been looking forward to), we couldn't hear them very well.

Twiddling of the thumbs, flying at approx 11400 feet and minus 55 degrees outside. Reflection - cabin crew have been excellent, cheerful, helpful and patient when queues of toilet trippers continually surround their snack trolley!

7.10pm...we're off! Procedures at Sanford were simple and quick, as was getting the car from Alamo - no hard sell or pressure to upgrade. The kids waited outside the Alamo building but forgot to seek shade, boy did the heat hit us! So glad I decided on shorts on jeans for the journey, unlike Sam. We were directed to the midsize area of the parking lot (I can say that now, we're on US territory and choose what we wanted - a white car to reflect the heat of the sun...not many whites, we picked the first one we saw, a Pontiac G6.

Here follows our first stressful moment! The road plan was to join the I4 west from Lake Mary Blvd. but in following signs for the I4 I directed Lee to a right turn and we ended up joining the 417 toll road north (or is it east?!). Slight problem...no change - we hadn't spotted a drinks machine at Sanford where we could have obtained some change. Lee was, understandably, reluctant to drive on without paying (signs warned of a $100 fine) so began to reverse (not wanting to really do this either...this was a one way entrance to the toll road!) but with traffic coming up behind we were stuck and were wondering what on earth to do! Just as I was about to get out and flag down a car to plead for change of a dollar bill who should pull alongside in the other lane...the sheriff!!

Yikes! I smiled sweetly, opened my window and explained our predicament. Luckily he was a very sweet man and provided some loose change and didn't want my dollar (how silly I felt afterwards trying to insist he took it...it's worth peanuts! We rolled up to the booth, popped the change in....oh. Ten cents short!! The sheriff was still there, and swallowing any remaining pride I shuffled back to his car and with what were probably bright red cheeks asked for another ten cents! Oh my, how embarrassing!

Now all we had to do was figure out where the heck we were headed...we had no idea where we were as we hadn't expected to hit a toll road! Light bulb moment! Mapman's map was buried at the bottom of my handluggage! Thank heavens! Fortunately a little boxed map to one side of the main section of the map made it clear that if we carried on we could join the I4 a little further north (east!) than planned. Onward...deep breath!

Any fears of terrible traffic or roadworks on the I4 were unfounded and Lee wasn't worried about having drivers overtake on either side. It was a peaceful and easy (cue Eagles tune!) journey down to the 192.

We picked up the villa key on the 192 from a locked security box and we soon at Westridge on the Nevada Loop (darn, we didn't get the gated community!) All in all, I think the journey took just under an hour from Sanford.

The villa was bigger than we had expected... a 4 bed with jaccuzi as well as pool and two living rooms.






Towels and plastic flowers were arranged on the beds and in the 3 bathrooms, but we couldn't help but notice that this villa was in need of a good lick of paint, a damp cloth around the skirting boards, and some scrubbing of the walls around the beds and in the corridors, some broken tiles around the jaccuzi, and some very basic supplies that we'd come to expect on previous holidy rentals in Europe, like a dishcloth and teatowel! Still, we weren't planning on spending much time in the villa so moved onto a trip to Applebee's at Berry town centre (conveniently only minutes away on the US 27),then on to Walmart at Cagan's Crossin for supplies, water and snacks, and a dip in the pool.

After some unpacking and TV time (and I thought we had rubbish TV in the UK, the basic TV package in the US is even worse! The best we could find was the Cosby Show!) we hit the sack, ready for an early start at Epcot the next morning. Surprisingly, it was a rough night, I thought we would have been exhausted, but with a new bed softness to get used to and some excitement about what was in store on our holiday sleep didn't come easily.

August was a busy month!

It brought:
An awesome vacation (more to follow on this, excuse the Americanisms, we seem to have come home with more than a few!)
starting an insurance claim for work resulting from a leak in the bathroom that has left an attractive hole in the living room ceiling!
GCSE results. (see below)
a manic post-holiday period of preparing for year 8 at grammar for Katie, getting Sam enrolled at the new Mid Kent College, writing up a CV and him sending it out all over town in an attempt to find some weekend work.
the beginning of a long haul of holiday photo uploading, editing and scrapbooking the memories.

Proud mum moment - Sam picked up his GCSE results the day after we got back from Florida. As usual he was as cool as a cucumber, pretty sure he'd got passes in everything except History. He did absolutely fine....2 BTEC First Certificate passes in Sport and Art & Design, GCSE Grade Cs in Maths, Additional Maths, Statistics, Science, Additional Science, English, Business & Communication Systems, at grade D: a short course in RE and in English Literature (shame because he loved Of Mice and Men), and a little higher than he expected a grade E in History (again, a shame, he had quite an interest in the World Wars). We were all very happy with that lot, and means Sam does get his place on the BTEC National Diploma in Construction and Civil Engineering at the new Mid Kent College. He starts next Monday.

As for the holiday, as promised I'll be uploading some piccies and some of my trip report....

It's been a while...

...since I blogged. I just got out of the habit....
Rather than do any seriously hard thinking at this time of the morning and do a recap of what I've been up to I'll just move on and take it from here :-)
Tomorrow is the moment I've been waiting for. Tomorrow we get up at 4am. Tomorrow we fly from Gatwick to Sanford. Tomorrow afternoon (ok, tomorrow evening if we're talking UK time!) we drive past Walt Disney world to find our villa for the fortnight. Tomorrow I can jump in the villa's pool with hub and the kids and refresh from that long journey. And (ok, so I shouldn't start a sentnce with 'and' but give me a break, I'm like a big kid and ultra-excited here!) the day after tomorrow we will be on Disney property and having the time of our lives!!

If you're not big on Disneymania and family holidays this could be a good time to switch off for a bit, in two weeks time my blog could become a bit of a trip report with photos for a while. If you're really lucky I might be able to find a wireless connection somewhere out there and whet your appetite with a photo or two ;-)

Til then, see ya, I'm off to see the Mouse!