TraceyL
Always planning........
- Joined
- Nov 7, 1999
- Messages
- 1,866
Not planning on doing full TRs this time but have started to cobble together a few (long) summaries> This one's on our travel & transportation......
'We' are....
Me & DH (Steve)
My mam & dad
Rachelle ( 8 ) & Annabelle almost 4
Saturday Nov 27th
We drove the 180 miles from South Wales to Gatwick in 2 cars Steve with all the luggage in his in the morning (cos he wanted to watch the England v Australia rugby match) & the rest of us headed off after ballet, squashed in the other car . With a stop for a KFC in the services en-route it took about 4 hours to get to The Lawns Guests House, Horley.
BA are now doing twilight check in so we went to the North Terminal just after 6pm with all the luggage (no buggies, no car-seats this trip
). No queues, checked in with our e-ticket got our pre-requested seats (two sets of 3 behing each other at the window), check in staff were friendly and happy result ! Then back to the local Wacky Warehouse for dinner - within walking distance of the B&B so we could all have a nightcap or 3!. Play area was closed for a private party so the staff gave the girls loads of colouring to do and all the main meals were 2 for 1. Steaks all round for not a lot of money.
Sun Nov 28th
Had our full breakfast in the morning and headed over to the airport at approx 9:30 for our 11:35 flight. Picked up our pre-ordered $$$ at the wrong Travelex desk (doh!!) and raided the duty free
Flight left on time (woo!) and was surprisingly pleasant (wed been spoilt and flew World Traveller + last year ) Staff were very friendly and were constantly bringing drinks around, varying films to watch managed to catch all of the Manchurian Candidate, girls good as gold as usual Rachelle read & did stickers for most of the flight, Annabelle had a good sleep and watched Monsters Inc.
Only two minor gripes at check in Id requested emergency exit seats for 3 of the adults but was told that even though they were available, because we had children in our party they werent allowed to seat any of us at the exits in case we swapped seats during the flight which I thought was fair enough. So I was annoyed to find an infant and a young girl sitting with grandpa in the exit seats on several occasions during the flight with mum & dad in the bulkhead seats minding the skycot. Second gripe was the food choices for dinner were chicken & leek or sausage and onion and for afternoon tea a cheese and onion roll (no choice). Guess who doesnt like onion?? Yup me!
We hit a bit of a head wind and landed 14 minutes late at MCO temp 75 degs woohoo Took us what seemed like an age to get through security, through immigration (not much of a queue). Official chatted to Steve for ages about his job in the Navy, fingerprints & photographs, collect the luggage, through Customs (where I got a right good telling off for picking my customs form out of my pile of passports with my teeth!
), get the bags x-rayed, drop it off, ride the shuttle, get the hand luggage x-rayed again (video cameras and laptops OUT of bags if you please!), take your shoes off (again), struggle to put shoes back on in amongst throngs of holiday makers eager to beat you to the baggage carousels! Then off to get the bags again - $3 for the trolleys now and can I ever get 3 consecutive $1 bills to feed into the machine? Can I hell
! Luggage reacquired we head for the Dollar desk woohoo no queues again! No hard sell- you have already paid for everything madam dont speak too soon Tracey you have a young child madam - youll need a car seat I falter momentarily, um no its ok the car you have allocated us has built in seats -same as last year.
Damn I get given a car seat and told to hand it back in if we find we dont need it when we get to the car and then the charge will be waived. We cross over to the rental garage and get given the keys to our metallic blue (Rachelles favourite colour) Dodge Grand Caravan with built in car seats. Surprisingly the luggage (3 large cases, 1 med, 1 small case) fits with ease into the trunk with a few small bags in the car. Unfortunately the ladies in the kiosk wont accept the car seat back so Steve takes it back into the terminal building to make sure were not charged for the seat. Just after 5pm EST (just over an hour after landing) were heading out of the South exit of the airport for the Florida Greenway to Kissimmee.
'We' are....
Me & DH (Steve)
My mam & dad
Rachelle ( 8 ) & Annabelle almost 4
Saturday Nov 27th
We drove the 180 miles from South Wales to Gatwick in 2 cars Steve with all the luggage in his in the morning (cos he wanted to watch the England v Australia rugby match) & the rest of us headed off after ballet, squashed in the other car . With a stop for a KFC in the services en-route it took about 4 hours to get to The Lawns Guests House, Horley.
BA are now doing twilight check in so we went to the North Terminal just after 6pm with all the luggage (no buggies, no car-seats this trip
Sun Nov 28th
Had our full breakfast in the morning and headed over to the airport at approx 9:30 for our 11:35 flight. Picked up our pre-ordered $$$ at the wrong Travelex desk (doh!!) and raided the duty free
Flight left on time (woo!) and was surprisingly pleasant (wed been spoilt and flew World Traveller + last year ) Staff were very friendly and were constantly bringing drinks around, varying films to watch managed to catch all of the Manchurian Candidate, girls good as gold as usual Rachelle read & did stickers for most of the flight, Annabelle had a good sleep and watched Monsters Inc.
Only two minor gripes at check in Id requested emergency exit seats for 3 of the adults but was told that even though they were available, because we had children in our party they werent allowed to seat any of us at the exits in case we swapped seats during the flight which I thought was fair enough. So I was annoyed to find an infant and a young girl sitting with grandpa in the exit seats on several occasions during the flight with mum & dad in the bulkhead seats minding the skycot. Second gripe was the food choices for dinner were chicken & leek or sausage and onion and for afternoon tea a cheese and onion roll (no choice). Guess who doesnt like onion?? Yup me!
We hit a bit of a head wind and landed 14 minutes late at MCO temp 75 degs woohoo Took us what seemed like an age to get through security, through immigration (not much of a queue). Official chatted to Steve for ages about his job in the Navy, fingerprints & photographs, collect the luggage, through Customs (where I got a right good telling off for picking my customs form out of my pile of passports with my teeth!
I'm travelling with BA (WT Plus) on my next trip so glad you were happy with it. Thanks for the report.
- they're little monsters usually 
