mandymouse
Bahama Mama Time !!
- Joined
- Mar 8, 2003
- Messages
- 72,440
Castmembers
Me, Mandy Christmas Co-ordinator Extraordinaire/Mega-Planner
DH, Paul Driver, always goes with the flow, cant make important
decisions like where were going to eat
DD1, age 14 Jasmine/Tinker Bell mad
DD2, age 12 Thinks she likes Stitch more than me (but I do !!)
Our Christmas Day/Airport & Arrival
Friday 16th December
Woohoo, Its our mini-Christmas Day, although we are traveling to the airport tonight, we decided to let the girls have the day off school so that we could have our Christmas. We were all up around 7am (Paul still had to work today) so we took some video of the girls opening their presents before Paul had to leave. I did really well with some Disney T-Shirts, Santa Stitch, Disney jewelry, a Mickey statue and the Eminem CD.
Luckily Paul finished work around 3ish and we were all ready and in the car and listening to my new CD by 4.10pm and on our way to Manchester. We headed straight to the airport, as that afternoon I had seen on the MyTravel website that they did night before check-in. We arrive at the Check-in area around 6.30pm, and the only other people around were a family who were trying to check-in too. The other family go off to another airline desk to enquire about the early check-in and they ring someone upstairs to try and help us. 5 minutes later a young lad arrives and says that early check-in is usual used in the summer, but he will allocate our seats and take our luggage, but we will have to return in the morning for our boarding cards. Half an hour later the other family and ourselves have handed over our cases and we have been seated near the front of the plane (row 14). Job done !!
Next we go off to find our hotel, Princess Jackson had mentioned that a new Travelodge near to the airport had just opened, so we thought wed give it a go (and for only £26 too). We quickly found the hotel and it was very impressive and new, we dropped our overnight stuff in then set off to the Trafford Centre for a wander round and some tea at the KFC.
About 9ish we head back to the hotel for an early night (big mistake), first we saw the final of Space Cadets (we hadnt watched any of this) which was a laugh, then we were too excited to sleep, then Becky was sick in the night so I couldnt relax, so by getting up time (4.45am) I was absolutely shattered.
Saturday 17th December
We left the room around 5.30am, and we rang the Meet & Greet people to come and pick up the car at Terminal 1. Unfortunately they didnt have our details, but someone would be there in 15 minutes, when the guy came he was very apologetic, he took the details of our return and mentioned something about the computer (blah, blah). So by 6am we were heading to the desk near Check-in to pick up our boarding cards, and thankfully there were no problems and within minutes we had gone through to departures. We had a quick breakfast of toast/bacon baps & orange juice and at 8am they began boarding. We left promptly at 8.30am, and then began the longest ever flight to Sanford (or so it felt), the films were very poor, there was The Island, The Fantastic Four and Charlie & the Chocolate Factory. As a lot of people had raved about C&TCF, I thought Id watch that (though Johnny Depps hair was very off putting), well Im sorry I thought it was dreadful, so I watched a bit of The Island, but Id seen it before. The food on board was lovely, we had like a pasta bolognaise, with cheese and crackers, cake etc. We landed at Sanford around 1.30pm, we were off the plane by 1.40pm, then we cleared customs, grabbed our luggage that was on the carousel as we walked through and we had chosen our car (the guy at Alamo said just go out and chose one) and were pulling out of the airport at 2.10pm BRILLIANT!!
About 45 minutes later we went under the 'Walt Disney World' sign, and we were back. It was our first visit to the Pop Century, and when we arrived we were very impressed at the size of it, and how colourful it was. The lobby was empty, so we were checked in within minutes and the CM informed me that there was a parcel waiting for me, so she went off to get it and returned with the Christmas tree that Anna had arranged for us (she had checked out that day). So by this time I was bursting with excitement. Very quickly I emptied the suitcases while Paul and the girls put the tree together. We put it on the table and it looked great.
By 4.30pm we had arrived at Disneys MGM Studios, the fastpasses had all gone and it was quite busy so we decided to have dinner, we all had chicken strips & fries and then the girls did some shopping. As we were shattered we decided to pop to Wal-Mart for some bits and pieces like the cooler ($15) that we filled up every other day with ice so that we didnt have the expense of hiring a fridge and we got the usual water, cookies, Mountain Dew and Lays chips.
I think we were in bed and asleep by 9pm but up the next morning at 4.30am.
Me, Mandy Christmas Co-ordinator Extraordinaire/Mega-Planner
DH, Paul Driver, always goes with the flow, cant make important
decisions like where were going to eat
DD1, age 14 Jasmine/Tinker Bell mad
DD2, age 12 Thinks she likes Stitch more than me (but I do !!)
Our Christmas Day/Airport & Arrival
Friday 16th December
Woohoo, Its our mini-Christmas Day, although we are traveling to the airport tonight, we decided to let the girls have the day off school so that we could have our Christmas. We were all up around 7am (Paul still had to work today) so we took some video of the girls opening their presents before Paul had to leave. I did really well with some Disney T-Shirts, Santa Stitch, Disney jewelry, a Mickey statue and the Eminem CD.
Luckily Paul finished work around 3ish and we were all ready and in the car and listening to my new CD by 4.10pm and on our way to Manchester. We headed straight to the airport, as that afternoon I had seen on the MyTravel website that they did night before check-in. We arrive at the Check-in area around 6.30pm, and the only other people around were a family who were trying to check-in too. The other family go off to another airline desk to enquire about the early check-in and they ring someone upstairs to try and help us. 5 minutes later a young lad arrives and says that early check-in is usual used in the summer, but he will allocate our seats and take our luggage, but we will have to return in the morning for our boarding cards. Half an hour later the other family and ourselves have handed over our cases and we have been seated near the front of the plane (row 14). Job done !!
Next we go off to find our hotel, Princess Jackson had mentioned that a new Travelodge near to the airport had just opened, so we thought wed give it a go (and for only £26 too). We quickly found the hotel and it was very impressive and new, we dropped our overnight stuff in then set off to the Trafford Centre for a wander round and some tea at the KFC.
About 9ish we head back to the hotel for an early night (big mistake), first we saw the final of Space Cadets (we hadnt watched any of this) which was a laugh, then we were too excited to sleep, then Becky was sick in the night so I couldnt relax, so by getting up time (4.45am) I was absolutely shattered.
Saturday 17th December
We left the room around 5.30am, and we rang the Meet & Greet people to come and pick up the car at Terminal 1. Unfortunately they didnt have our details, but someone would be there in 15 minutes, when the guy came he was very apologetic, he took the details of our return and mentioned something about the computer (blah, blah). So by 6am we were heading to the desk near Check-in to pick up our boarding cards, and thankfully there were no problems and within minutes we had gone through to departures. We had a quick breakfast of toast/bacon baps & orange juice and at 8am they began boarding. We left promptly at 8.30am, and then began the longest ever flight to Sanford (or so it felt), the films were very poor, there was The Island, The Fantastic Four and Charlie & the Chocolate Factory. As a lot of people had raved about C&TCF, I thought Id watch that (though Johnny Depps hair was very off putting), well Im sorry I thought it was dreadful, so I watched a bit of The Island, but Id seen it before. The food on board was lovely, we had like a pasta bolognaise, with cheese and crackers, cake etc. We landed at Sanford around 1.30pm, we were off the plane by 1.40pm, then we cleared customs, grabbed our luggage that was on the carousel as we walked through and we had chosen our car (the guy at Alamo said just go out and chose one) and were pulling out of the airport at 2.10pm BRILLIANT!!
About 45 minutes later we went under the 'Walt Disney World' sign, and we were back. It was our first visit to the Pop Century, and when we arrived we were very impressed at the size of it, and how colourful it was. The lobby was empty, so we were checked in within minutes and the CM informed me that there was a parcel waiting for me, so she went off to get it and returned with the Christmas tree that Anna had arranged for us (she had checked out that day). So by this time I was bursting with excitement. Very quickly I emptied the suitcases while Paul and the girls put the tree together. We put it on the table and it looked great.
By 4.30pm we had arrived at Disneys MGM Studios, the fastpasses had all gone and it was quite busy so we decided to have dinner, we all had chicken strips & fries and then the girls did some shopping. As we were shattered we decided to pop to Wal-Mart for some bits and pieces like the cooler ($15) that we filled up every other day with ice so that we didnt have the expense of hiring a fridge and we got the usual water, cookies, Mountain Dew and Lays chips.
I think we were in bed and asleep by 9pm but up the next morning at 4.30am.
Your 
What did you think to Pop? Or have you stayed there before?
)))).
