Ten years ago today...

[Hilary]

... we were on our very first flight to Orlando!

Little did I know what I was letting myself in for!

I'd only just discovered the internet back then (on a college course), and certainly wasn't connected up at home so had no access to any Disney information if I'd thought of looking. How things have changed in such a short time.

I'd bought one WDW guidebook (not Simon's ) and had a s-i-l who gave me the best possible advice - plan your days - which I chose to ignore! I thought she was mad and naiively assumed it would all work out okay when we got there We made a note of some of the things we wanted to do, but that was about it.

The Virgin rep at our first hotel (we moved after the first night because we didn't like it) was wonderful and sorted us out with tickets and an itinerary for the 2 weeks.

The rest, as they say, is history We were hooked, and talking about going back to WDW even before we were on the plane home!

Had you discovered the internet or Orlando ten years ago?

 

[Miffy2003]

Orlando - yes! I was lucky enough to go for the first time 12 years ago. It was another 9 years before we went back though!

Internet - not quite 10 years ago - but nearly! I cannot imagine life without it now!

 

[Kevin Stringer]

First went to WDW in 1988 when it was just the MK and Epcot.

I can't remember when we first got hooked up to the internet, but that's not half as memorable, is it?

Kev

 

[KayleeUK]

Neither

 

[BONZO]

Time flies doesn't it? - LOL

WDW first time 1988 (belated honeymoon) and then back again the following year! - *bliss* - no kids!

Yes, only MK and Epcot....jumpers for goalposts etc!

Internet? - had access at work for many, many years - previously trained in COBOL, FORTRAN etc on 10" floppies!

 

[squitty]

Time flies doesn't it? - LOL

It sure does Shaun when you're having fun

Orlando, yes, we were lucky enough to have our first visit back in 1992

Internet, think it was about 1997 we got it.

 

[allie5]

Thats funny, its our 10th Anniversary this year too! Our very first trip was back in Oct 1995. We were young ,free and single...but DH proposed on that trip!! We came back the following year to get married.

Strangely, if all goes to plan, we will be in Florida at exactly the same time this year, so who votes we should renew our vows at the Wedding Pavillion (with an obligatory stay at the GF as well of course!!).

Internet...that was about 1998 I think. Was there really life before it?

 

[Miffy2003]

Strangely, if all goes to plan, we will be in Florida at exactly the same time this year, so who votes we should renew our vows at the Wedding Pavillion (with an obligatory stay at the GF as well of course!!).

Well Allie I feel it would be highly rude not to!

 

[AndRu]

Now I'm gonna sound old ... I used to post on dial up bulletin boards and started around 1989 but they had been running a while before that. My first forays onto the internet were around 1992 with work and joined Demon internet to use it from home in early 1993.

But in the last 10 years I've ...

Had three beautiful children.
Held the following jobs [in order]Order picker / fork lift driver / warehouse shift supervisor / junior system support / application support technician / senior development analyst. Don't you just love job titles eh?
Moved from Leicestershire to York and then in 2001 moved to Derbyshire.
Oh, and we've been to Orlando 3 times!

Now I know why I'm going grey!

 

[Mrs Dazzle]

Nice thread, Hilary

Well, my first trip to Florida was in 1983 - a belated 21st birthday pressie from my DB's then girlfriend, who worked for Air Florida. It was due to be a long weekend away in the middle of October, since I'd always wanted to meet Winnie the Pooh in Florida, so Eva arranged it all. It turned into a four week tour around Florida, literally from East to West and was fantastic. Especially when the whole thing literally only cost me £100. Because of Eva's job, we got free hotel accommodation (and some very nice hotels too too), free cars etc etc. So that £100 was food and spending money. Like Bonzo, there was only MK and Epcot in WDW - no beloved Universal or anything much else, but we had a great time travelling around a lot of the beaches and the Miami area.

We were only supposed to be there for three weeks, but in those days there were only a couple of flights a week - into Tampa. We were on standby and missed one weeks' flight, so had to wait for the next available flight

This particular part of the holiday wasn't so pleasant since we'd run out of most of our money by now - we were staying in this yukky motel on Miami beach where the door didn't lock properly. We took it in turns at night to be on "watch" - there were some pretty bad problems with drug gangs in the area we were told by the police in those days, so wasn't much fun.

We even resorted to visiting the timeshare presentations to get the $20 each or meal vouchers

However, it was (at the time) one of the most fantastic holidays I'd ever been on and I promised myself that if I ever had children, I would take them to see Cinderella's castle and they could get the lump in their throat that I got when I saw it for the first time

As for the internet, I was a "guinea pig" at work for this - ooh, must be 12 years or more now. It seemed pretty scary at first, but boy has it come on since those days. I still remember being lectured about how - in the Year 2000 - we would be a "paperless society". Hmmm, that's not happened

 

[Andrew Bichard]

My first visit was a day trip to Magic Kingdom in the summer of 1976.
I had married two years previously to an american, born in New York.

At about the same time we married, her parents moved to Dayton Beach in Florida. From 1976 onwards we visited with them almost every year, and at least once each trip we would visit one of the theme parks in Orlando. As a result I have visited EPCOT, MGM, Universal Studios and much more recently, Animal Kingdom ever since they opened. We have also travelled extensively in Florida from the Key West to Savhanna just over the border.

If I add all my trips together, I have been in Florida for almost two years.

By 1996, we could no longer stay in Daytona, because I had started to use a wheelchair and my Father-in-Law's house wasn't accessible. We therefore had our first on-site visit to WDW, staying at Boardwalk Inn, which had opened the year previously. We have since bought DVC timeshare points and stay onsite (mostly at Boardwalk) for three weeks about three years out of every five. My Father-in-Law, who is now 92, comes visit with us there.

We have just booked or flights for this year. We usually book Fly/drive with Virgin Holidays (but never collect the car), because this works out cheaper than flights only. This year I qualified for a 10% discount as a 'Frequent Virgin'. I have also bought Annual Passes for myself and my wife using the 20% DVC member discount. We will be making two visits to Disney 11 months apart to fit two holidays into the same annual pass. This works out at less than five and a half dollars a day each for our time in the Disney parks! And the £/$ exchange rate make the deal even better.

With our APs, we hope to get discounts on regular rooms before and after our DVC stay (we don't have enough points to stay DVC for our entire trip) but we won't be able to book these until discount codes are published. Finally, I intend to buy DDE (Disney Dining Experience) which will give us a 20% discount at most dinners at Disney.

Andrew