Hi there! I'm Josie, a 28-year-old lover of all things Disney & Harry Potter. I'm an assistant accountant for a motor group, from the Midlands but currently living in Lincolnshire with my fiancé, Mike. Mike's a 25-year-old merchandiser for a well-known hardware chain, and he loves video games, Harry Potter, and also Disney (just not as much as me
). We got engaged in Disneyland Paris in November 2017, and are currently saving up for our wedding! Here's a quick snap of us on our third visit to the Harry Potter Studio Tour just before Christmas:
So last year I got
super excited about our October 2020 Disneymoon in Orlando, and created a pre-trippie telling all about our to-be-booked plans. I was feeling really down truth be told, as with also saving for a house as well as the wedding, we didn't have any spare cash for a Disney trip (or a holiday in general) before then.
As I mentioned, Mike loves video games, and as a result he's met people from all over the world. One of his best friends (who just happens to live in Irvine, around fifteen minutes from Disneyland in California - she has an annual pass! The actual dream) got engaged just after us, and last Summer they booked their wedding, which we're invited to. The only problem is that their wedding is in Kauai, Hawaii, which looks a little something like this...
We had a big discussion about it, because obviously a holiday to Hawaii was not in our savings plan. We eventually decided that Mike really didn't want to miss the wedding, and I didn't want to miss Hawaii! It's a hell of a way to fly for a week, so when the bride offered us her Irvine apartment for the following week (whilst she was on her honeymoon), a plan came together:
Saturday 20th July:
Sheraton Skyline at Heathrow – I booked this as a mystery hotel with parking on holidayextras, and I’m really excited to stay here!
Sunday 21st July:
Virgin flights to LAX, a night at the H Hotel, Los Angeles.
Monday 22nd July – Friday 26th July:
Fly to Kauaii (we still need to book these flights!). We’ve booked an air bnb which is directly opposite the wedding venue (and the beach), it looks great and was around half the price of a hotel. We don’t have any set-in stone plans for this week other than the wedding on the Wednesday, but we’re going to hire a car. I’m really excited to explore the island 😊. We’ll fly back to Los Angeles on the Friday evening, and stay at the apartment for the rest of the week.
Saturday 27th July:
We’re going to be tourists in the morning (Hollywood walk of fame, Chinese theatre etc) and then in the afternoon we’re doing the Warner Bros Studio Tour –
so excited for this.
Sunday 28th July:
Beach day! Well kind of, we’ll be exploring the Venice Beach area and going to Santa Monica Pier 😊. I’m hoping to nip to Downtown Disney in the evening for a nosey around too, fingers crossed!
Monday 29th July:
This is a very exciting day – Universal Studios! My parents very kindly treated us to these tickets for Christmas. I adored US in Orlando and Mike’s never been, so I’m really excited to share this with him. I know that it’s a lot smaller than in Florida, but hopefully that means we’ll get most things done in a day
.
Tuesday 30th & Wednesday 31st July:
Disney days
! Saving the best til last 😉. I can’t believe that I’m actually going to be stepping foot in Walt’s Disneyland, it really is a dream come true. We’ve park hopper tickets and will be trying to cram in as much exploring as possible over the two days.
Thursday 1st August:
We fly home ☹ we have the overnight Virgin flight back to the UK, so I wouldn’t mind nipping to a Walmart before we head off to the airport.
I know that we’re packing a lot into 12 days, but it’s all that we can afford financially and in terms of annual leave from work. I’m hoping that this trip will be enough of a taster to see if we get hooked on California, as I’d love to do Yosemite/San Fran etc one day. Please let me know if you have any tips or recommendations for our time either in Kauai or California, my only food must-do so far is in-n-out burger haha 😊
Josie xx
