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Old 27 Feb 16, 07:20 PM  
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Kpzorse
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Kpzorse's Reviews
Hotel Reviews: 2
Restaurant Reviews: 4
Our First Trip to WDW -*Feb 2015* Travel Day. Flight from Gatwick.Arriving at Caribbean Beach Resort

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We woke at around 8ish at our room in the Hampton by Hilton hotel.

I was first (as always) to use the bathroom and shower, as it always takes me an age to get ready and get my make-up done (while the DF is pretty much- brush teeth, shower, do hair- READY!).

We had a free breakfast included in the price of our room, so headed down about 9 (9.30?) to grab some food. We ended up both being really impressed by the huge range of breakfast food there. It was pretty quiet when we were down with just a few families sitting around, reading the papers etc.

I had a cooked breakfast with a coffee and an orange juice. The DF had the same (x2) with a juice. I think I may have helped myself to a croissant as well.

At around 10ish we headed back up to our room to pack up our stuff before checking out of the hotel. I put on my ‘oh so attractive’ flight socks, as my Mum has always been prone to leg swelling and pain after long flights, I never want to risk it.

I had bought a solid shampoo bar from Lush to take with me on the trip. I can’t remember the name of it, but it was a kind of muddy beige colour. The smell was earthy and overwhelming. Unfortunately to my dismay everything in my suitcase now smelt of it too. I ended up chucking it away in the end. YUK!

We headed across to the second terminal with our cases. I literally don’t know how people manage with a second suitcase and a carry on. I hate lugging just one each around!

We checked in (we had already reserved our seats a couple of weeks before) with no hassle, got rid of our cases and were off to security. Again, we got through this with very little fuss, in probably, record time.

We had a little mooch around the shops and duty free. I bought a water and a magazine in WHSmiths (God, that scanning your boarding pass is annoying!) and we strolled around most of the shops. We had left plenty of time until our flight which meant a little waiting around but we didn’t mind that. I had a browse in the Victoria’s Secret store and waited for them to call our flight.



At 12pm and announcement appeared on the board and we headed down towards our gate. We ended up being probably the fourth family onto the flight- which was good as we were right at the back and ended up helping ourselves to couple of nice glossy complimentary magazines beforehand.

We had pre-booked the ‘2-seater’ seats at the far back of the plane (about three from the back) and came to find we had a little space next to the seat where we popped our complimentary pack containing blanket, eye mask etc.



If I remember rightly, we set off a little late. It as pouring with rain outside and I remember my tummy being full of butterflies as I hadn’t flown in a few years.

Not long after take-off the attendants came round with little bags of pretzels and the drinks trolley. We both just had the mini cans of coke. I checked what movies they had on the IES. I watched Big Hero 6 and Lucy- starring Scarlett Johansson. Both were really really great.

Before I knew it lunch was on the way. We both wanted the beef but by the time they reached us all the way in the back of the plane that option was gone. We went for the chicken instead which was still nice. I think it came with a salad, a bread roll and a little chocolate orange GU pudding which I don’t think I ate.

About half way through the flight, the attendant began serving more drinks and the lady in front (who refused to un-recline her seat throughout the journey) spilt half her tea across her lap. The cabin crew rushed to clean her up, but instead of giving her cup to the staff the lady precariously balanced said cup on the trolley, which of course, went flying as soon as the staff moved it. Where, did said tea land, I ask you? Yes, you guessed it! All over me! I was very upset and really annoyed. The cabin crew apologised but I knew it obviously wasn't their fault. Anyway ten minutes later I was dried off and was just settling back to my film when one of the stewardesses came over with a first class sleeper suit tucked under her arm. She said if I wanted to change into it in the toilets I could. I told her it was ok and that I had pretty much all but dried off, but she pushed it into my hands and whispered "Keep it, just in case- they go for a lot of money on ebay y'know."

Our journey was fairly turbulent. But a little while later the cabin crew served a little afternoon tea with a sandwich (cheese and pickle?) some more drinks, ‘plane’ crisps and a rocky road.

We were all given a little fab ice lolly just before landing which went down a treat.

We landed an hour later, I think we may have been about 50 minutes delayed. And we were of course, being right at the back, some of the last off the plane.

We headed into immigration and must have spent about an hour in a queue there. We were stuck behind a really obnoxious man from the UK who did nothing but moan really loudly about how his bags were probably going to be stolen as this was taking so long. We were glad to finally get our passports stamped and get shot of him. :angry:

Off we went to get our bags and headed across on the monorail to the other terminal.

We had booked through Virgin and so were entitled to a £100 Disney gift card at the desk. If we could find it that was.

We traipsed up and down, but for the life of us couldn’t work out where to go. I didn't know about the Dibb before hand so hadn't done all that much research. In the end, a friendly guy who worked at the airport asked us if we were lost and ended up taking us down to the ground floor where the Virgin desk was located.

Here we picked up our gift card and the lady there pointed us in the direction of the transfer buses (wish we'd have known about the Magical Express back then!).

When we got outside the Florida heat finally hit us. Lovely!

The Mears transport people all seemed really confused about our booking. They all kind of looked at our print offs and shrugged. They gave us a button which would beep/glow when they were ready and we were told to wait on some benches nearby.
About 20 minutes later a minibus was ready. They packed 9 people (10 if you include the driver) into this smallish van and off we went.

It was getting dark by the time we finally left the airport. It was nice to see some of the 'sights' along the way. Neither of us had been to the US before so we enjoyed staring out of the window, taking everything in.

It made three stops to drop off some people before FINALLY about an hour later it was our turn. The bus finally pulled up at the gate of Caribbean Beach Resort. At this I'm guessing the attendant at the gate asked why he was driving through, for only for the driver so say 'I'm dropping off the, um... what's your name again?" The DF shouted his name ( Matt Parker) through to him (we were sat all the way at the back) but for some reason the driver had trouble understanding him. "Can you spell it?" asked the driver. :angry: Getting redder and redder in the face the DF was made to spell out his name across the van. Cue another shrug from the driver to the attendant when they failed understand him even when he spelled it out. Eventually- probably sick of the hassle the attendant just waved us through. Jeez, the DF was speaking English, I cant imagine the palava if he had a strong accent!


Anyway we FINALLY made it! Two and a half hours after we landed in MCO!

We headed to the check in desk. It was very quiet in there and we were called up immediately by a young boy. He looked like he was new. It took him a while to find our details, he seemed very nervous. It took him ages to input our address and our telephone numbers- it seems as though we wasn't used to inputting UK details into the system. Anyway, we got as far as getting our magic bands but when asked for a credit card number the cast member must have touched the wrong button- "I, um, I'm really sorry" he uttered shaking his head. It seems as though he had lost all the progress up until this point. We were so tired after being up for about 17 hours by this point but we just smiled and told him it was no problem. Like I said, we're never ones too make a fuss. I think the the CM felt bad for keeping us waiting for so long. He was just about to allocate us our rooms when he rushed up and had a chat with a person that looked like his manager he came back grinning, turned to the screen and said 'Ok so your rooms are in Trinidad North. We've put you in one of our special Pirate Rooms."
I had seen these rooms on line but from memory they were about £200 extra so decided to forgo at the time, so I was ecstatic.

We thanked him and he pointed us in the direction of the bus. I had been told that you were unable to take luggage on the internal buses but after about 5 minutes a bus pulled up and we got on. The driver didn't say anything so we were happy.

Our room took a while to find- the layout of the 'villages' is kind of confusing, and the map we had didn't really seem to help. Eventually we found it and tested our Magic Bands out before heading inside.

The room itself was incredible. Such good theming!







It was around ten thirty by that point and we were starving, having had nothing to eat since our fab lolly on the plane. ​We decided to head down to the food court.

One of the criticisms that CBR had when I researched into it online, was that everything in the resort was so spread out. Our 'village' was the furthest away from the food courts and main pool, but even so, it only took us ten minutes to walk over to it.

I grabbed some chicken nuggets and fries and a bottle of water (I think the DF had the Angus burger and fries). We had the Quick Service dining plan so decided to grab our refillable mugs and test them out. We took both trays to the tills where a cast member set the mugs up for us. We paid via the dining plan (we had no idea we were entitled to desserts too by this point!) and grabbed a table.

I vaguely remember it being fairly quiet. We ate and then had a quick peek at the hammocks situated on the beaches by the lake.



Then we headed back to our room where we finally passed out, ready for our first full Disney day tomorrow.
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Old 28 Feb 16, 10:20 AM  
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Short legs
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Good travel day apart from the tea incident! Looking forward to reading more.
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