highlander447
<font color=green>It's a dirty job but someones go
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2003
- Messages
- 3,389
Mrs Highlander's Fabulous 40th Trip
Cast: Me:- Steve 40 something,paymaster general
DW:-Jacquie 40 soon will be something,
DD:-Stephanie 16 typical teenager,drama queen, princess (etc,etc)
DS:-Danny 14 (enough said)
Pre-Trip background
My DW was due to turn 40 in 2007 and I thought take her somewhere nice to celebrate the big day, but she didn't want to leave the kids
behind or them to miss school, so we planned the celebration for after her birthday during the October holidays, originally it was to be one week at the YC with dining plan via FC (UK Travel agent)star class, but after our Easter trip we felt a little apprehensive at spending nearly £5K on a week at a hotel that may have been over run by a convention as we had seen it in Easter, so we cancelled that trip and booked accommodation separately from flights which we booked direct with Continental from Edinburgh, initially I booked 5 nights at Comfort Inn LBV and 5 nights at RPR, the saving we made along with the deposit from FC paid for a week in Spain in August so that was good.
In the summer I got my bonus so I thought stuff it and
changed the booking to Comfort Inn LBV for 2 nights (could only book 2 nights not just 1), Wilderness Lodge 4 nights and RPR 5 nights,
then the HOB announced a concert that DD was keen to see on day we should check in to RPR, so I contacted Val (UK TA) who managed to book 1 night at the WL for us so I re-looked at RPR and saw that they had a super-saver rate available in club for our last 4 nights so I changed to that, okay that's the hotels sorted.
Fast forward to October 4 days before our trip I had kept the WL a secret from DW up until now but to be honest the stress was too much as I knew that it would be a nightmare trying to stop her from unpacking at Comfort Inn so I told her and showed her the WL
she was extremely pleased, and I have to admit it did relieve the pressure from me.
Fast forward to October 11th after a restless nights sleep I'm up at 4am watching law and order, have a bath around 5 and wake family around 5:45, taxi turns up at 6:30 and we are in check in queue for 7, even although you do check in online its pretty useless as you still go through same carry-on at check in, we head to Wutherspoons (British pub) for breakie, DD doesn't want anything even although they have a veggie breakie on offer, so two rolls and bacon plus one full breakie, 1 large OJ, 1 large coke total £15 not bad really, through security no problems, duty free 2 litres of spirits £15 can't say no really, kids get a few things from WHS (UK newsagent).
Flight boards 10 mins late then we are held up for an extra security check just me and DS after the frisking we are allowed to board, flight leaves 15 mins late as they are a crewman short and they are waiting on one coming off another flight, flight was boring, food was usual fare, although they had no veggie meals at all so DD was not best pleased as she had turned down the breakie, film was Fantastic 4 rise of silver surfer, bought a litre of Absolut for $17 at that
price be silly not too. On arrival the immigration queue is huge but luckily we are sent into USA queue and are through in 30 mins, luggage is waiting and we still have an hour before our connection great stuff we thought, drop cases again for next flight after stowing drink, then we head to security this is where we hit a problem they refuse to let us through as our second boarding pass does not have Newark on it, despite my protests they wont yield DW begins to fear that my protests are about to turn ugly but I do turn around before that occurs, main problem is they don't even tell you what
to do they just say no, I spy a Conintental agent who's not very helpful but points us to check in desks, so see a girl there she calls around pushes buttons but still can't print us new boarding passes, she's confused as to why we cant get through security and eventually issues us security passes to cross security, we make our next flight with 5 mins to spare before gate closes. The flight is then delayed by 30mins as were in queue for take off, then we need to fly around a storm, upshot is we arrive an hour late but yippee we got there, Q****silver driver was Carlos a nice man great difficulty understanding
me though, I tell Carlos to miss the grocery trip and take us straight to Comfort Inn, a bit of a queue at check-in, but by 7pm we are in our room #3117 which is a good location as it faces the car park and is definitely less noisy than highway side, dump the luggage quick wash up change clothes and its off for dinner originally meant to be Hooters but as DD had only had sweets today so far we headed to Cicis at her request, Cicis has risen in price to $5.49 but at that price still very good value 4 meals plus 4 juices after a 10% coupon used only $28, they had a decent selection of 5 pizzas 3 desserts, 2 pastas, salads, and a soup (sorry no pics as memory card got lost). After dinner we walked up to Crossroads and caught a taxi to Wal-Mart ($13) few hours $750 lighter a taxi back to hotel ($16), kids watched Suite Life, DW went too bed, kids followed soon after, I hit the land of nod around 1 :zzz:
Cast: Me:- Steve 40 something,paymaster general
DW:-Jacquie 40 soon will be something,
DD:-Stephanie 16 typical teenager,drama queen, princess (etc,etc)
DS:-Danny 14 (enough said)
Pre-Trip background
My DW was due to turn 40 in 2007 and I thought take her somewhere nice to celebrate the big day, but she didn't want to leave the kids
behind or them to miss school, so we planned the celebration for after her birthday during the October holidays, originally it was to be one week at the YC with dining plan via FC (UK Travel agent)star class, but after our Easter trip we felt a little apprehensive at spending nearly £5K on a week at a hotel that may have been over run by a convention as we had seen it in Easter, so we cancelled that trip and booked accommodation separately from flights which we booked direct with Continental from Edinburgh, initially I booked 5 nights at Comfort Inn LBV and 5 nights at RPR, the saving we made along with the deposit from FC paid for a week in Spain in August so that was good.
In the summer I got my bonus so I thought stuff it and
changed the booking to Comfort Inn LBV for 2 nights (could only book 2 nights not just 1), Wilderness Lodge 4 nights and RPR 5 nights,
then the HOB announced a concert that DD was keen to see on day we should check in to RPR, so I contacted Val (UK TA) who managed to book 1 night at the WL for us so I re-looked at RPR and saw that they had a super-saver rate available in club for our last 4 nights so I changed to that, okay that's the hotels sorted.
Fast forward to October 4 days before our trip I had kept the WL a secret from DW up until now but to be honest the stress was too much as I knew that it would be a nightmare trying to stop her from unpacking at Comfort Inn so I told her and showed her the WL
she was extremely pleased, and I have to admit it did relieve the pressure from me.
Fast forward to October 11th after a restless nights sleep I'm up at 4am watching law and order, have a bath around 5 and wake family around 5:45, taxi turns up at 6:30 and we are in check in queue for 7, even although you do check in online its pretty useless as you still go through same carry-on at check in, we head to Wutherspoons (British pub) for breakie, DD doesn't want anything even although they have a veggie breakie on offer, so two rolls and bacon plus one full breakie, 1 large OJ, 1 large coke total £15 not bad really, through security no problems, duty free 2 litres of spirits £15 can't say no really, kids get a few things from WHS (UK newsagent).
Flight boards 10 mins late then we are held up for an extra security check just me and DS after the frisking we are allowed to board, flight leaves 15 mins late as they are a crewman short and they are waiting on one coming off another flight, flight was boring, food was usual fare, although they had no veggie meals at all so DD was not best pleased as she had turned down the breakie, film was Fantastic 4 rise of silver surfer, bought a litre of Absolut for $17 at that
price be silly not too. On arrival the immigration queue is huge but luckily we are sent into USA queue and are through in 30 mins, luggage is waiting and we still have an hour before our connection great stuff we thought, drop cases again for next flight after stowing drink, then we head to security this is where we hit a problem they refuse to let us through as our second boarding pass does not have Newark on it, despite my protests they wont yield DW begins to fear that my protests are about to turn ugly but I do turn around before that occurs, main problem is they don't even tell you what
to do they just say no, I spy a Conintental agent who's not very helpful but points us to check in desks, so see a girl there she calls around pushes buttons but still can't print us new boarding passes, she's confused as to why we cant get through security and eventually issues us security passes to cross security, we make our next flight with 5 mins to spare before gate closes. The flight is then delayed by 30mins as were in queue for take off, then we need to fly around a storm, upshot is we arrive an hour late but yippee we got there, Q****silver driver was Carlos a nice man great difficulty understanding
me though, I tell Carlos to miss the grocery trip and take us straight to Comfort Inn, a bit of a queue at check-in, but by 7pm we are in our room #3117 which is a good location as it faces the car park and is definitely less noisy than highway side, dump the luggage quick wash up change clothes and its off for dinner originally meant to be Hooters but as DD had only had sweets today so far we headed to Cicis at her request, Cicis has risen in price to $5.49 but at that price still very good value 4 meals plus 4 juices after a 10% coupon used only $28, they had a decent selection of 5 pizzas 3 desserts, 2 pastas, salads, and a soup (sorry no pics as memory card got lost). After dinner we walked up to Crossroads and caught a taxi to Wal-Mart ($13) few hours $750 lighter a taxi back to hotel ($16), kids watched Suite Life, DW went too bed, kids followed soon after, I hit the land of nod around 1 :zzz:
another trippie.... I love to read 'em..... more please! 
(btw, glad you were able to get thru security...whew! close one!) 
