Living in Jamerica - The Bud Light Years Pre-Trippy(1)

[JoJo88]

“Living In Jamerica” The Bud Light Years - October 2011

The Bit Before the Bit Before

I’ve never attempted a trip report before, but love reading other people’s so decided to give it a go!

The Cast

Me, Jo, 37, obsessive planner, obsessive worrier, control freak & general stress-head!

Now, make the most of this photo as I won’t be appearing in many. I must be the most unphotogenic (or should that be “least photogenic”? ) person I know. This picture is acceptable, most are not, for fear of frightening the children. I don’t know what it is because in real life I am often mistaken for whoever happens to be gracing FHM’s latest Hot List, but somehow the camera doesn’t seem able to pick this up…….

DH, Simon, 35, so laid back he’s horizontal, prefers Florida as a whole rather than WDW but still gets caught up in the magic occasionally

DS, Adam, 8, water baby, complete roller coaster nut, newbie Harry Potter fan, and burger connoisseur. Pretends he’s outgrown Disney but is the first one up to march round the restaurants ‘on parade’

DS, Daniel, 6, an absolute sweetheart, just loves new experiences, happy to sit back and watch the world go by, but will get stuck in if there’s things to get stuck into

DM, Linda, ‘Grandma’ 57, (lindaelaine on the Dibb), jet-set Jill, is not happy unless she has a holiday booked. Has become a cruise addict – since her first one last year has now been on five! Happiest watching the boys enjoy themselves.

DD, Brian, ‘Grandad’ 58, not one for big rides (see Alternative Title). Happy to mind the bags and watch the world go by instead.

The Title
It could be a case of ‘you had to be there’ and probably is, but I’ll do my best to explain where the title comes from. So, Daniel has a collection of soft toys, his favourite being a red puffle named Roly, (more on puffles later). Now, from time to time (courtesy of Simon), Roly develops different accents, and will introduce himself in whichever accent with the words ‘hi, my name’s Roly, I come from China/Germany/Scotland etc” with one such example being Jamaica. How this goes down with Daniel very much depends on his mood, sometimes he can be in hysterics and other times he gets really cross. Anyway, as usual Roly came on holiday with us, where Daniel started to take over ‘strange accent’ duty, and the one that stuck was ‘Hi, my name’s Roly I come from Jamerica’. It became a sort of catchphrase of the holiday and so I felt it only right to use it here The Bud Light Years bit comes from when Simon spotted Bud Light on the menu at Manny’s Chophouse and had a very long and informed conversation with our server about the difference between Bud Light and Bud, and this particular wonderment continued throughout….. See, clear as crystal!

I feel one of my alternative titles, “I think I’ll sit this one out” deserves its own special mention, so here goes. I promise, I’ll get on with the real thing soon )

Now, back in September of last year, My Mum & Dad set out on a Caribbean cruise, which would be leaving from Port Canaveral. They decided to take advantage of being in Florida by booking a few nights in Orlando beforehand. They also decided to visit Epcot. Whilst in Epcot they decided to do a few rides. Test Track & Soarin’ were favourites from last year, and they went on both, picking up a Fast Pass to go back on Soarin’ later in the day as it’s my Dad’s absolute favourite, he’d stay on it all day if he could (remember this). Then they decided to slow down the pace and go on Spaceship Earth.

This is where it all went horribly wrong. They went on this by mistake.

Orange version.

Those of you who were on the Dibb last September might possibly recognise this sorry tale as I posted a thread about it back then, it was far too priceless to keep to myself! Here It Is In short, I received an email from my Mum confessing what they had done, and can honestly say, I was laughing about it all day long. They had thought it odd when they didn’t recognise the boarding process, and then their EPIC FAIL suddenly dawned on them when they saw sick bags by their seats! Mum was aware of a ride in Epcot that isn’t good for those who suffer from motion sickness – her being one of them, and soon realised she was about to discover exactly how bad her motion sickness was. My Dad isn’t one for big rides anyway, and so with a bit of reassurance (it’ll soon be over), and advice to close his eyes if he didn’t like it (an announcement was made before the ride started saying NOT to close your eyes as it can make you worse), off they went on their mission to Mars. Safe to say that Mission Space doesn’t feature highly on their list of must dos, and also safe to say that they won’t be going on it again. “Should have gone to Specsavers! ”

They exited the ride in complete silence, eyes forward, heading as far away from there as they possibly could. Mum said it was about an hour before she plucked up the courage to even look at my Dad, let alone speak to him. When they did eventually speak, all my Dad could say was ‘I don’t remember THAT from last time’! Eventually their return time for Soarin’ came round and they both felt so ill still that they couldn’t face it!

So, after that particular escapade, my Dad is now verrrrrryyyyy wary of what he is queuing up for, and if he’s in the slightest bit of doubt as to how truthful we are being about an attraction, then he won’t ride, hence ‘I think I’ll sit this one out’.

Background
Simon & I first went to Florida in October/November 1999. We stayed at St Pete’s Beach for the two weeks, but I was allowed to choose 3 theme parks I wanted to visit. Allowed?! I’d have done more if I’d wanted to thank you very much, I’ll show you who wears the trousers in this relationship mister. This was of course back in the days when you went in to the Travel Agent, booked a holiday and basically waited until you got there (well, it was for me), and so I wasn’t fully aware of what was available. I knew of the Magic Kingdom, obviously, and also Epcot, because my Dad had been out to Florida for work when I was younger and had been to Epcot. Incidentally all he could remember about it was sitting in the Rose & Crown! Tut tut. Anyway, my first choice was MK, naturally, having been a Disney fan since my Dad returned from the above trip with mini plushes of Mickey, Donald, Goofy & Pluto. I also chose Universal Studios as it was another ‘famous’ park, and Busch Gardens because it was close by. I had no clue about the planning that should go into a visit to Disney, MYW tickets, or ADRs, EMHs or FPs, so we just paid on the gate, waited 45 minutes for lunch at Crystal Palace without realising it was a Character meal, happened upon the parade by mistake and generally just bimbled our way around! Actually, did Fast Passes even exist back then?

We had an absolutely brilliant time, and over time it remained our most favourite & cherished holiday, and we’ve had some great holidays!

(This is Mexico)

We would drive up & down the coastline to Clearwater, stopping off at places along the way, lovely meals in the evenings, shopping. It was my first ever visit to the States and I was smitten.

I’m sure we would have returned sooner had we not had ‘bigger’ plans - it was just before this holiday that we decided to start a family, and so big two week breaks that had to be booked a while in advance were replaced with spur of the moment weekends away while we concentrated on other things. It’s funny but I always remember flying home from that first Florida holiday thinking ‘next time we come here it will be with our children’, and we did return with our children, 10 years later to the absolute day. I only remember this because it was Bonfire night, November 5th.

Anyway, children didn’t happen as quickly as we hoped, but eventually they came along, two blue ones, and we always knew that when we thought the time was right, we would get ourselves back to Florida. In July ’08 I got the ball rolling and we were soon booked up for November ’09. Our boys would be 6 & 4 at the time of the holiday, which we felt would be about right to be able to cope with the long flight, long days and yet still young enough to feel the magic (although when do we ever grow out of it?! )

So, off we went, 2 fantastic weeks, staying in a villa in Windsor Hills. Like a lot of people, we thought it would be a once in a lifetime holiday and so we went all out. Disney tickets, Universal tickets, Seaworld, a night at Universal, MVMCP, a fab villa as close as we could get to everything. My parents came along too which was great, my Mum had never been to Florida and lives for her grandchildren so it was really lovely that she could share in it all too.

We had the time of our lives, so much so that we soon realised it couldn’t possibly be a once in a lifetime thing, we HAD to come back!

And so here we are, having come back for the second time, and we still don’t have it out of our systems, and are (well I am! ) already planning a third visit. So, without further ado, I’ll get on with this trip report……….

Pre-Trippy Part 2

[Lindaelaine]

So good of you to remind me of my '' mission to mars '' I have read so many trippies since i joined the Dibb , i didnt think i would get to read one that i am actualy a part of keep up the good work Jo , so glad you decided to do a trippie of our lovely holiday

[orlandosgr8]

Lovely to read about your previous holidays, looking forward to reading about your latest trip.

[JoJo88]

Originally Posted by Lindaelaine

So good of you to remind me of my '' mission to mars '' I have read so many trippies since i joined the Dibb , i didnt think i would get to read one that i am actualy a part of keep up the good work Jo , so glad you decided to do a trippie of our lovely holiday

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Be afraid, be very afraid

Originally Posted by orlandosgr8

Lovely to read about your previous holidays, looking forward to reading about your latest trip.

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Thank you

[pixie81]

Lovely to hear a bit of background about your lovely family and your previous trips. Looking forward to reading the rest of your trippie. x

[summersun]

cant wait to read more

[Gill635]

This is hilarious! You write lovely by the way, there was a tear in my eye when you were talking about starting your family. Hope you had an amazing holiday


xxx

[JoJo88]

Originally Posted by pixie81

Lovely to hear a bit of background about your lovely family and your previous trips. Looking forward to reading the rest of your trippie. x

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Awww, thank you

Originally Posted by summersun

cant wait to read more

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I'm getting there, part 2 of the pre-trippy and travel day are up. I'm hoping to get Day 1 posted by the end of the weekend

Originally Posted by Gill635

This is hilarious! You write lovely by the way, there was a tear in my eye when you were talking about starting your family. Hope you had an amazing holiday


xxx

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Awww, thank you, I had a tear in my eye reading your lovely comments!

[Cinnabon]

Fantastic intro.
Sat here with tears running down my face with your parents on mission space.

[Juliemack]

Sorry, I seem to be reading backwards...just discovered this after reading 'travel day' had a good laugh anyway, off to read the next installment... I think