BudgieMama
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Sep 15, 2013
It's been a while! It's taken me weeks to find the time to edit all those photo pass photos, but they're finally done and I need to make a start on this here trip report whilst I can still remember some of the details!
Normally travel day isn't too much of a hassle for us- we live 45 minutes from Gatwick on a direct train route, so getting there is no problem. With an 11.20am flight, we needed to be there for at 8.20am. Normally, no worried... but Southern Rail aren't working to their normal efficiency and we decided an early morning arrival on a Sunday was perhaps a little dangerous, and booked a taxi.
The taxi gave us a very stress free departure after saying goodbye to our beloved baby birds for the longest time we've ever been away from them. Arrived at the airport dead on time, had a lovely driver who turned out to be from my home town over 200 miles away, and after a not-too-long wait, we'd done bag drop and headed through security. It seemed like everyone was getting pulled for inspection on their hand luggage, but we succeeded in not having the wrong stuff in our bags, and sailed through.
(We'd opted not to book our seats early and to just cross our fingers for seats together. We were lucky enough to get a pair of seats at the front of economy, which gave us extra leg room. There were no babies in the sky cots next to us either, so definitely was a great result for us).
We headed to our favourite spot at Gatwick North Terminal to sit and enjoy some natural daylight as we waited, and the time seemed to whizz by and we were called to gate on time. We headed down to the gate and found somewhere to sit and wait, and watch them load our plane:
We were some of the last to board, which I'm always happy with as I'd sooner be on the plane for as little time as possible, and had plenty of room to store our hand luggage and get settled- definitely very happy with that extra legroom. I somehow ended up with another broken seat, and this time wasn't even offered an apology by the cabin crew.
I often get very bored on flights, but managed to keep myself more entertained this time- one thing at a time! I watched Captain America: Civil War, which I'd been wanting to see, but fell asleep part way through and woke up to find Tony in Spiderman's bedroom, which was a tad confusing. Food was nice enough as always- we had some chicken thing, but I can't remember what! I spent some time colouring, listened to an audio book, chatted with hubby, we exchanged anniversary cards on the plane, and then settled to watch Silver Linings Playbook. Sadly, I was made to stow my screen just 10 minutes from the end of the film! D'oh!
Landed on time, and we disembarked very quickly, so didn't have too long to wait at immigration... only to have our bags among the last to come off the plane. Sigh! By the time we had our luggage the queue for customs was both enormous and confusing. It seemed to merge from three different places, with no-one trying to make it anymore organised. We ended up joining the right part of the queue, but I think we merged in front of lots of people who had waited a lot longer than we had! Oh dear!
Soon found our way to the Magical Express Check-in Desk, and were headed out to our bus. CSR was the first stop on our route- hooray!
Arrived at CSR with no problems, and having completed online check-in, joined that queue as it was shorter, which confused the first CM we spoke to- she wanted to know why we hadn't just gone to our room, but we pointed out we had come from the UK and didn't have Magic Bands yet, and she sped off to find them. Details sorted very quickly, and found out we had a room in Cabanas 8A, which is just what I'd wanted! Opted to walk there rather than ask for Bell Services, and enjoyed the beautiful stroll. Got a little confused as to where our room was, and where the stairs were, but found it in the end!
Room was nice and clean, and perfectly located. Only minor bother was it was an adjoining room, and our next door neighbours spent the first evening listening to rap music rather loudly!
I was hungry, so popped back to the Pepper Market to pick up our mugs (handle mugs FTW!) and get some food- I was too tired to worry about what I wanted, and just went for a burger which came with amazing wedges! Yum! Oh, and my first Mickey Krispie Treat of the trip, of course!
After a good feed, and a gentle chill, we headed to bed around 9pm, ready for our EMH at AK the next day!
Normally travel day isn't too much of a hassle for us- we live 45 minutes from Gatwick on a direct train route, so getting there is no problem. With an 11.20am flight, we needed to be there for at 8.20am. Normally, no worried... but Southern Rail aren't working to their normal efficiency and we decided an early morning arrival on a Sunday was perhaps a little dangerous, and booked a taxi.
The taxi gave us a very stress free departure after saying goodbye to our beloved baby birds for the longest time we've ever been away from them. Arrived at the airport dead on time, had a lovely driver who turned out to be from my home town over 200 miles away, and after a not-too-long wait, we'd done bag drop and headed through security. It seemed like everyone was getting pulled for inspection on their hand luggage, but we succeeded in not having the wrong stuff in our bags, and sailed through.
(We'd opted not to book our seats early and to just cross our fingers for seats together. We were lucky enough to get a pair of seats at the front of economy, which gave us extra leg room. There were no babies in the sky cots next to us either, so definitely was a great result for us).
We headed to our favourite spot at Gatwick North Terminal to sit and enjoy some natural daylight as we waited, and the time seemed to whizz by and we were called to gate on time. We headed down to the gate and found somewhere to sit and wait, and watch them load our plane:
We were some of the last to board, which I'm always happy with as I'd sooner be on the plane for as little time as possible, and had plenty of room to store our hand luggage and get settled- definitely very happy with that extra legroom. I somehow ended up with another broken seat, and this time wasn't even offered an apology by the cabin crew.
I often get very bored on flights, but managed to keep myself more entertained this time- one thing at a time! I watched Captain America: Civil War, which I'd been wanting to see, but fell asleep part way through and woke up to find Tony in Spiderman's bedroom, which was a tad confusing. Food was nice enough as always- we had some chicken thing, but I can't remember what! I spent some time colouring, listened to an audio book, chatted with hubby, we exchanged anniversary cards on the plane, and then settled to watch Silver Linings Playbook. Sadly, I was made to stow my screen just 10 minutes from the end of the film! D'oh!
Landed on time, and we disembarked very quickly, so didn't have too long to wait at immigration... only to have our bags among the last to come off the plane. Sigh! By the time we had our luggage the queue for customs was both enormous and confusing. It seemed to merge from three different places, with no-one trying to make it anymore organised. We ended up joining the right part of the queue, but I think we merged in front of lots of people who had waited a lot longer than we had! Oh dear!
Soon found our way to the Magical Express Check-in Desk, and were headed out to our bus. CSR was the first stop on our route- hooray!
Arrived at CSR with no problems, and having completed online check-in, joined that queue as it was shorter, which confused the first CM we spoke to- she wanted to know why we hadn't just gone to our room, but we pointed out we had come from the UK and didn't have Magic Bands yet, and she sped off to find them. Details sorted very quickly, and found out we had a room in Cabanas 8A, which is just what I'd wanted! Opted to walk there rather than ask for Bell Services, and enjoyed the beautiful stroll. Got a little confused as to where our room was, and where the stairs were, but found it in the end!
Room was nice and clean, and perfectly located. Only minor bother was it was an adjoining room, and our next door neighbours spent the first evening listening to rap music rather loudly!
I was hungry, so popped back to the Pepper Market to pick up our mugs (handle mugs FTW!) and get some food- I was too tired to worry about what I wanted, and just went for a burger which came with amazing wedges! Yum! Oh, and my first Mickey Krispie Treat of the trip, of course!
After a good feed, and a gentle chill, we headed to bed around 9pm, ready for our EMH at AK the next day!
