fizz13
01-01-2006, 07:44 PM
HOW OUR TRIP CAME TO BE
As we're finally into 2006 and I can say "This year I'm going to Disneyworld!!" I thought it was time to start thinking about my next trip.
INTRODUCTION
Of course, for most of us, the thought of a second trip starts the minute we set foot home from the previous trip. In our case this was January 2005 (read incomplete trip report ). My husband was not ready to go again for a long while, and the kids had been quite tiring so I could see the logic in waiting. However, you can't get away from pixiedust for long, so how was I going to get back? There had also been a lot of detail I had missed out on from being in a large group (ie. compromising) so the thought of going alone and absorbing all I wanted was very attractive.
In the meantime, DH had already agreed I could go an an all girl trip to Turkey in the summer of 2005 while he looked after the children. I had wanted to have some girly fun for as long as I can remember and this was finally to be my year. The 6 of us going were fairly close but after booking in december had started to have problems and divides. Oh how I wished I had used my solo time for disney instead.At one point I even tried to back out of the holiday, but it would have been too costly for the others in the group so I agreed to keep my plans because DH said if I wanted to go to disney so badly to give up this longed for holiday, then I could have my trip sometime in 2006!!
I knew that I would only be able to go for one week because of leaving the children and DH taking holiday time from work, but when to go? I needed time to save enough money and I also wanted to go in a low season, without extreme weather. September looked good but I didn't want to be away while the kids were settling back into school, so I looked at the fun October, with Food and Wine festival and the Halloween party. Of course, there is a school holiday that falls in October, so I started rethinking the solo trip. Could I maybe take my DD with me? She loved thrill rides and would be 7 by then, quite old enough to eat in nice places and being mature, would be happy to look at gardens, displays etc. Yes our own girls trip seemed quite a good idea. DH was more than accepting ( well it is one less child to tend to) so we had a plan.
21 st to 28th October for mum and DD7
At this point, my mind started wandering. Wouldn't it be lovely if my MIL could come too? She has been nothing but wonderful to me and I have been officially adopted for the past 8 years. It would be lovely for her to have quality time with her grandaughter and she would appreciate all I wanted to acheive. Sadly on this occasion I was turned down for financial reasons. It was over sometime in the spring that DD's friend came to over to play. She is a delightful, intelligent mature girl and her mother, who is equally lovely and great company always, is sadly raising her alone. I wonder?... They were delighted to be asked and DD was even more delighted
21st october to 28th october for mum28, DD7, DD friend 7, 2nd mum 40
Do you see where this is going? Ok, so with the 4 of us onboard, I waited for the Virgin holidays brochure to be released. On may 16th 2005, I finally booked our holiday. I chose Coronado Springs for several reasons:
budget wise, I could not go higher than a moderate
I didn't like the look of Carribean Beach
The theming and pool of Coronado Springs won out over Port Orleans
being a convention resort, the buses would not be as full ( so I heard!)
Being the good girl that I am, I started sending Virgin £200 a month to cover costs. I also requested the dining plan and park tickets
BIG MISTAKE
And I'll tell you why. Firstly I should know that I am the best at ferreting out good deals on park tickets and I could have saved about £30 form the virgin price. Why didn't I? Well Virgin like to charge an admin fee of £25 every time you change your booking. For the sake of £5 not worth it. I did cancel the dining plan though because when I added up the costs of what I estimated us to eat, it was a big enough saving to go without. Me and DD just don't eat that much! Enjoy my £25 Virgin We have also booked Virgin transfers butI have been assured that I can cancel these when I get to Orlando without penalty. I'm holding you to that Richard Branson..
forward to october 2005...
DS4 was getting a bit upset about the thought of big sis going to disney and not him. Who can blame him? but do I really want to take 2 kids? Can I afford it? It won't really be a girls trip then will it? Ok, so Dh and me sat down and did some maths. yes, I could afford it at a stretch but would we get the booking? There was no availability online soIi rang Virgin to see what we could do. Now do you ever get the feeling that we know more than the professionals... First I held for 30 minutes (yes really silly me) then i got passed through 2 different departments, cut off, held again, then told that department was closed for the night, try again tommorrow...WHAT!!! Ok, breathe.... so I did. I'm not going to give you every gory detail, except to say my son is now coming but has his own booking which is attached to mine. I had to amend our holiday to stay a night extra and change our flight time going out so that we could accomodate him (another £25 for Richard!) Oh yes, and apparently since the original booking they have introduced ridiculous surcharges of £60 per person for fuel. So that will be another £180 on our bill then. The main point is, DS is coming, I get anothet night in Disney, and 2 kids to look after (lets go for the new heading then...)
21st to 29th October!, for DD7, DS5, mum27, friend7 and her mum40 at Coronado Springs with ripoff Virgin Holidays
Oh yes, just to add that friend and her mum have kept original booking obviously because why should they pay silly surcharges etc. but we are now on different flights both ways and friend of DD is none to pleased that a BOY will be on her trip. Quite right really. Wait for it, there is one more to come. Remember my lovely grandad from previous trip report? If you don't, he bought me a timeshare in Orlando and has supported my whole life in every way imaginable, well he would like to come on the trip too!! Seeing as its not just a girls trip anymore, he dioesn't feel bad about asking...oh well, lets book you up. In December, the week the flights were released from Virgin Atlantic, grandad got booked on our flights but in premium economy. Very nice for some eh!? We then booked hotel with disney online and ordered park tickets for him and DS from http://www.mercurytravel.net, they always give the best prices around and send actual tickets, not vouchers. So we now have...
All of the above plus Grandad73
Where did my peaceful, detail absorbing solo trip go?? Anyway, now I get to plan an itinerary for 6 people of all ages to enjoy. My family knows better than to try and interfere in my itineraries but I have yet to have the talk with the other mum. Let you know how it goes. BTW, no pressure or anything, but Disney now changed its policy to book restaurants 180 days in advance, so I have to get active. Only 113 days till I can start making those ADR's.. ah the yummy decisions to make.
And so begins my trip journey. Please check back often as I plan to keep this page a bit like a trip planning blog, updating everytime I do something trivial like change the order of attractions ( yes really I will, so sorry). please come along for the ride and thanks for reading this far...
happy planning,
Clairexx
As we're finally into 2006 and I can say "This year I'm going to Disneyworld!!" I thought it was time to start thinking about my next trip.
INTRODUCTION
Of course, for most of us, the thought of a second trip starts the minute we set foot home from the previous trip. In our case this was January 2005 (read incomplete trip report ). My husband was not ready to go again for a long while, and the kids had been quite tiring so I could see the logic in waiting. However, you can't get away from pixiedust for long, so how was I going to get back? There had also been a lot of detail I had missed out on from being in a large group (ie. compromising) so the thought of going alone and absorbing all I wanted was very attractive.
In the meantime, DH had already agreed I could go an an all girl trip to Turkey in the summer of 2005 while he looked after the children. I had wanted to have some girly fun for as long as I can remember and this was finally to be my year. The 6 of us going were fairly close but after booking in december had started to have problems and divides. Oh how I wished I had used my solo time for disney instead.At one point I even tried to back out of the holiday, but it would have been too costly for the others in the group so I agreed to keep my plans because DH said if I wanted to go to disney so badly to give up this longed for holiday, then I could have my trip sometime in 2006!!
I knew that I would only be able to go for one week because of leaving the children and DH taking holiday time from work, but when to go? I needed time to save enough money and I also wanted to go in a low season, without extreme weather. September looked good but I didn't want to be away while the kids were settling back into school, so I looked at the fun October, with Food and Wine festival and the Halloween party. Of course, there is a school holiday that falls in October, so I started rethinking the solo trip. Could I maybe take my DD with me? She loved thrill rides and would be 7 by then, quite old enough to eat in nice places and being mature, would be happy to look at gardens, displays etc. Yes our own girls trip seemed quite a good idea. DH was more than accepting ( well it is one less child to tend to) so we had a plan.
21 st to 28th October for mum and DD7
At this point, my mind started wandering. Wouldn't it be lovely if my MIL could come too? She has been nothing but wonderful to me and I have been officially adopted for the past 8 years. It would be lovely for her to have quality time with her grandaughter and she would appreciate all I wanted to acheive. Sadly on this occasion I was turned down for financial reasons. It was over sometime in the spring that DD's friend came to over to play. She is a delightful, intelligent mature girl and her mother, who is equally lovely and great company always, is sadly raising her alone. I wonder?... They were delighted to be asked and DD was even more delighted
21st october to 28th october for mum28, DD7, DD friend 7, 2nd mum 40
Do you see where this is going? Ok, so with the 4 of us onboard, I waited for the Virgin holidays brochure to be released. On may 16th 2005, I finally booked our holiday. I chose Coronado Springs for several reasons:
budget wise, I could not go higher than a moderate
I didn't like the look of Carribean Beach
The theming and pool of Coronado Springs won out over Port Orleans
being a convention resort, the buses would not be as full ( so I heard!)
Being the good girl that I am, I started sending Virgin £200 a month to cover costs. I also requested the dining plan and park tickets
BIG MISTAKE
And I'll tell you why. Firstly I should know that I am the best at ferreting out good deals on park tickets and I could have saved about £30 form the virgin price. Why didn't I? Well Virgin like to charge an admin fee of £25 every time you change your booking. For the sake of £5 not worth it. I did cancel the dining plan though because when I added up the costs of what I estimated us to eat, it was a big enough saving to go without. Me and DD just don't eat that much! Enjoy my £25 Virgin We have also booked Virgin transfers butI have been assured that I can cancel these when I get to Orlando without penalty. I'm holding you to that Richard Branson..
forward to october 2005...
DS4 was getting a bit upset about the thought of big sis going to disney and not him. Who can blame him? but do I really want to take 2 kids? Can I afford it? It won't really be a girls trip then will it? Ok, so Dh and me sat down and did some maths. yes, I could afford it at a stretch but would we get the booking? There was no availability online soIi rang Virgin to see what we could do. Now do you ever get the feeling that we know more than the professionals... First I held for 30 minutes (yes really silly me) then i got passed through 2 different departments, cut off, held again, then told that department was closed for the night, try again tommorrow...WHAT!!! Ok, breathe.... so I did. I'm not going to give you every gory detail, except to say my son is now coming but has his own booking which is attached to mine. I had to amend our holiday to stay a night extra and change our flight time going out so that we could accomodate him (another £25 for Richard!) Oh yes, and apparently since the original booking they have introduced ridiculous surcharges of £60 per person for fuel. So that will be another £180 on our bill then. The main point is, DS is coming, I get anothet night in Disney, and 2 kids to look after (lets go for the new heading then...)
21st to 29th October!, for DD7, DS5, mum27, friend7 and her mum40 at Coronado Springs with ripoff Virgin Holidays
Oh yes, just to add that friend and her mum have kept original booking obviously because why should they pay silly surcharges etc. but we are now on different flights both ways and friend of DD is none to pleased that a BOY will be on her trip. Quite right really. Wait for it, there is one more to come. Remember my lovely grandad from previous trip report? If you don't, he bought me a timeshare in Orlando and has supported my whole life in every way imaginable, well he would like to come on the trip too!! Seeing as its not just a girls trip anymore, he dioesn't feel bad about asking...oh well, lets book you up. In December, the week the flights were released from Virgin Atlantic, grandad got booked on our flights but in premium economy. Very nice for some eh!? We then booked hotel with disney online and ordered park tickets for him and DS from http://www.mercurytravel.net, they always give the best prices around and send actual tickets, not vouchers. So we now have...
All of the above plus Grandad73
Where did my peaceful, detail absorbing solo trip go?? Anyway, now I get to plan an itinerary for 6 people of all ages to enjoy. My family knows better than to try and interfere in my itineraries but I have yet to have the talk with the other mum. Let you know how it goes. BTW, no pressure or anything, but Disney now changed its policy to book restaurants 180 days in advance, so I have to get active. Only 113 days till I can start making those ADR's.. ah the yummy decisions to make.
And so begins my trip journey. Please check back often as I plan to keep this page a bit like a trip planning blog, updating everytime I do something trivial like change the order of attractions ( yes really I will, so sorry). please come along for the ride and thanks for reading this far...
happy planning,
Clairexx