Let me give you a bit of the background behind our trip. My husband turned the BIG 40 on Monday, March 31. I knew I wanted to plan a surprise trip for him and had decided on Universal after reading all the wonderful comments from these boards. I researched, planned and booked the trip and he knew absolutely nothing about it. He only knew he had to schedule to be away from the office on Friday, Monday and Tuesday. Beyond that, he was clueless. Of course he asked dozens of questions, called every friend and family member hoping to get some info, but no one would tell him a thing.
Finally Friday, the big day, arrives. He doesn't even know if we are driving or flying to our destination. We get in the car and off we go. It doesn't take too long for him to figure out we are heading to the airport, but I check us in at the curb and he goes off to park the car so when we meet up again he still has no idea of our destination. I lead him from gate to gate so he doesn't figure out we are going to Orlando until the last possible moment. Of course when he first hears Orlando, his first thought is Disney, but I keep swearing we aren't going there. Finally as we are almost in Orlando he finally guesses Universal! He still has no clue that my parents will be meeting us at the baggage claim.
We head off to baggage claim to get our luggage and lo and behold my parents are waiting for us there. Their plane arrived about 30 minutes before ours. He was shocked! I had scheduled with Fl. Tours to have a car pick us up and they were waiting for us (Andy was the driver) right on time. I was very pleased with this service and will definitely use them any time we go back. We stopped off at the grocery story for a few things and then we were finally at the Portofino! The hotel is very beautiful...and very large. It is U-shaped around the water. We were in the East Wing and the very end of the hotel in rooms 1385 and 1387. We felt like we walked more getting to and from our room than we did in the theme parks. Check in was a little slow, but was fine. We had the entertainment rates and asked about the Loews "perks" and they promptly asked what ammenity we would like. We both ordered wine and both bottles arrive within the hour. The papers were delivered every day and my husband used the fitness center every day with no charge. Only snafu here was the lady who checked us in wrote down the wrong room numbers (really the wrong floor number) on both the information she gave to us and to the bell hop. She had written down 1285 and 1287. We walk all the way down the hall and our keys don't work. it is about 10:30pm by this point. The bellhop uses his master key to get us in and he walks in on a couple in bed, and they weren't sleeping, if you catch my drift!!!!! We could have died....all of us! We practically ran down the hall. He calls down to the front desk and figures out we should be in 1385 and 1387. So we go up one more floor and the keys work just fine. After we got in the room and thought about it, we all just busted out laughing, but at the time, we were all red as beets.
There were a ton of cheerleaders there until Monday and acting just like big groups of teenage girls would act like. I never saw anything out of hand, just a bunch of kids having a good time.
The parks were dead in the mornings, but busier in the afternoons. The front of the line access is something I don't know if I can go without again. Even though the waits were usually just 20 to 30 minutes in the afternoon, we would ride each ride 3 times in that period. We rode every single ride in both Universal and Islands at least 3 times. I have never left a theme park feeling like I had rode everything and seen everything that I wanted to with complete satisfaction. We never had to say "we don't have time for that this trip, maybe next time"...we did it all.
We used the water ferry every time we went to the parks and it was always convenient. We never had to wait very long and it was often waiting on us.
Meals....lunches, Lombard's (very, very yummy), Mythos (good, but service was a little slow), International Film & Food court (fair at best) and the Tratoria at the hotel (the best lunch of the week)
Dinners...Latin Quarter (absolutely wonderful! walked right in on Saturday night while Margaritaville had a 90 minute wait), Hard Rock Cafe (did the Dinner and Movie for $18), very good but very, very loud and Mama Dellas (Loved it!!!)
All in all it was a wonderful trip. My hubby said it was the best birthday ever. I'm already looking forward to going back someday.
Finally Friday, the big day, arrives. He doesn't even know if we are driving or flying to our destination. We get in the car and off we go. It doesn't take too long for him to figure out we are heading to the airport, but I check us in at the curb and he goes off to park the car so when we meet up again he still has no idea of our destination. I lead him from gate to gate so he doesn't figure out we are going to Orlando until the last possible moment. Of course when he first hears Orlando, his first thought is Disney, but I keep swearing we aren't going there. Finally as we are almost in Orlando he finally guesses Universal! He still has no clue that my parents will be meeting us at the baggage claim.
We head off to baggage claim to get our luggage and lo and behold my parents are waiting for us there. Their plane arrived about 30 minutes before ours. He was shocked! I had scheduled with Fl. Tours to have a car pick us up and they were waiting for us (Andy was the driver) right on time. I was very pleased with this service and will definitely use them any time we go back. We stopped off at the grocery story for a few things and then we were finally at the Portofino! The hotel is very beautiful...and very large. It is U-shaped around the water. We were in the East Wing and the very end of the hotel in rooms 1385 and 1387. We felt like we walked more getting to and from our room than we did in the theme parks. Check in was a little slow, but was fine. We had the entertainment rates and asked about the Loews "perks" and they promptly asked what ammenity we would like. We both ordered wine and both bottles arrive within the hour. The papers were delivered every day and my husband used the fitness center every day with no charge. Only snafu here was the lady who checked us in wrote down the wrong room numbers (really the wrong floor number) on both the information she gave to us and to the bell hop. She had written down 1285 and 1287. We walk all the way down the hall and our keys don't work. it is about 10:30pm by this point. The bellhop uses his master key to get us in and he walks in on a couple in bed, and they weren't sleeping, if you catch my drift!!!!! We could have died....all of us! We practically ran down the hall. He calls down to the front desk and figures out we should be in 1385 and 1387. So we go up one more floor and the keys work just fine. After we got in the room and thought about it, we all just busted out laughing, but at the time, we were all red as beets.
There were a ton of cheerleaders there until Monday and acting just like big groups of teenage girls would act like. I never saw anything out of hand, just a bunch of kids having a good time.
The parks were dead in the mornings, but busier in the afternoons. The front of the line access is something I don't know if I can go without again. Even though the waits were usually just 20 to 30 minutes in the afternoon, we would ride each ride 3 times in that period. We rode every single ride in both Universal and Islands at least 3 times. I have never left a theme park feeling like I had rode everything and seen everything that I wanted to with complete satisfaction. We never had to say "we don't have time for that this trip, maybe next time"...we did it all.
We used the water ferry every time we went to the parks and it was always convenient. We never had to wait very long and it was often waiting on us.
Meals....lunches, Lombard's (very, very yummy), Mythos (good, but service was a little slow), International Film & Food court (fair at best) and the Tratoria at the hotel (the best lunch of the week)
Dinners...Latin Quarter (absolutely wonderful! walked right in on Saturday night while Margaritaville had a 90 minute wait), Hard Rock Cafe (did the Dinner and Movie for $18), very good but very, very loud and Mama Dellas (Loved it!!!)
All in all it was a wonderful trip. My hubby said it was the best birthday ever. I'm already looking forward to going back someday.
You have plenty of time to surprise me! 
does being a CPA allow you to work from home and spend more time with Olivia?
