Hey, Where's Perry? September 2011

[wizzo]

Your Cast for this year are……………

Paul (wizzo)(It’s me typing this) Same as every year, Author, Photographer, Sherpa & Accountant
Lynn (Lomaddy) – Mother, Shopper, Proof Reader and Crowd Control.
Lauren (7) – Growing up way too fast. Swimmer, Golfer and thrill rider.
Maddy (4) – Small but packs a mighty punch. Is now tall enough for Splash and BTM!
George (Grandad) – Recently retired professional tea maker.
Marie (Grandma) – Grandchild spoiler and a top notch shopper like her daughter.


Me, I'm the good looking one in the middle


Lynn, my good lady wife (I helped her with that ice cream)


Lauren, orange team all the way baby!


Maddy, yes you'll get another lanyard!


George and Marie, Babysitters... I mean grandparents


Well here we are again dear reader. Although there was a time after writing last years that I was convinced I wouldn’t write another trip report. If you’ve never written one it’s a big commitment. You need to make a lot of notes while you are there and when you get home it takes a good 2-3 hours to write a single day at the time when you are at the lowest point of your post holiday.

So, another year on, another year older but none the wiser! Still, as some consolation we’re going back to the magic. Regular readers of my trip reports may be forgiven for thinking that this pre-trip report has been accidently copied and pasted into here from last years report. You’d be wrong. There are some subtle differences. Well two really, the addition of a couple of grandparents.

You left us last October having had a fantastic 16 days in SSR/Yacht Club. If you haven’t read the previous trip report it’s HERE or look in my signature for links to all my trip reports.

Devastated to be home and with the financial spectre of Christmas looming we only had half an eye on the next trip for a few weeks there but it didn’t take long to get my Kayak alerts setup to keep an eye on those all important flight prices.

As everyone reading this knows, 2011 flight prices aren’t what they used to be……….they’re much BIGGER!

Around Christmas time Lynn’s folks decided they’d join us this year (they came with us previously in 2008) and we were delighted to have them onboard again. It seems our Florida holidays are beginning to fall into a bit of a pattern, one trip solo, then one with a set of grandparents and repeat.

One thing that appears to have changed though is staying in Villas. The lure of a private pool has been greatly outweighed by the lure of staying on site close to the action, the Free Disney Dining Plan and 43% off at SSR and OKW. I urge anyone who’s thinking of coming to Disney World to price up a stay at OKW or SSR as you might get a big surprise. All that said, I think the balance may shift back towards the villa complexes’ once the recession is over and Disney offers aren’t quiet as good.

So after the success of our trip to Saratoga Springs last year we’ve booked it again for this year. The difference this time is that with the extra two adults we’ve gone for a 2 Bed Villa which actually sleeps 8 and gives us the added benefit of having a communal living area, a full kitchen and a washer and dryer as well as the two separate bedrooms. Sharing a bed with the in laws is never advisable! Unless you’re married to Rumer Willis or Kate Hudson I suppose! (I’ll save you googling that, their “moms” are Demi Moore and Goldie Horn).

This year a 2 Bed villa was £3500 which included £2400 worth of free dining. So that’s the equivalent of 16 nights hotel for 6 people for £1100. You’ll be hard pushed to get a nice Villa for £1100 for 2 weeks and it means we are paying £68.75 per night for what are basically two hotel rooms and an adjoining area in the middle. So it’s £34.38 per room per night. You can’t book a Premier Inn for that here! That’s why I implore people to consider this great offer at SSR and OKW while it lasts. It’s already available for 2012.

Now I know some people will say “Yes but the £2400 you took off for the DDP isn’t real money” and you’re right it isn’t but speaking from the experience of last year when we had it, we hardly spent anything for the first 12 days of our holiday then once we changed resorts and lost the free DDP we haemorrhaged cash! I think most people out there will admit a family of 4 will have to budget on £100 a day on holiday for food and drink. That would be £1600 for my 4 and we got £1400 of free dining plan. I genuinely believe that the free dining plan is a fantastic offer and long may it continue in conjunction with the discounted rates at SSR and OKW.

Sales pitch over…...I’ll get back on with the trip report! (Honestly I’m not on commission, I just think a lot of people don’t do the maths and see how much this offer is worth).

Unlike last year, we’re staying put in one resort this time, although the lure of a few nights in an Epcot resort was really tempting we’re trying our best to resist splitting the holiday this time and staying put!

We have already decided that 2012 will be a couple of weeks or so in Animal Kingdom Lodge again (which we adored in 2009) or perhaps a Deluxe Epcot Resort but AKL will take some beating in our mind. Although if you’ve read any of our other trip reports you’ll know we are partial to changing our minds!

The weeks went by having booked the hotel in February and it looked like Indirect would be the only way to get half reasonable flight prices. Direct flights from our local airport Newcastle were a ridiculous £900 for an adult fare at one point. This is mainly due to the fact that Thomson’s now have a monopoly out of Newcastle.

Virgin out of Manchester were anywhere from £800-870 from when I started looking back before Christmas. Indirect flights from Manchester were a little better at around £600 with 2 stops but not ideal. Lynn’s folks were keen to go direct if at all possible as was Lynn after our escapades going indirect last year! Once again, read last years report for all the details of what happened on our outbound flights.

I’m more laid back (of course I mean tight you know me by now) and was happy to fly via Bulgaria, Singapore and Mexico City if it saved me a few quid! Thankfully for the rest of the party, one Sunday morning in March, Kayak alerted me to Virgin having had a change of heart for the dates we wanted and knocked an adult fare down to £650 from Manchester and the kids were about £530. I’d have still gone for the circumnavigation route personally but everyone else was sold on Virgin! Wimps!

So we fly out on the 22nd September on one of Virgin’s new A330’s and fly home on the 8th of October on one of Virgin’s tatty old (Dan Air style 70s retro) Jumbos!

ADR’s are booked and are too numerous to mention but include some old favourites like Jiko, Teppan Edo, Cali Grill, Shula’s Steakhouse and Le Cellier and a few we have managed to miss on previous trips like Sci Fi Diner, Restaurant Marrakesh and Nine Dragons.

Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party will be on the itinerary too after its smash hit status last year. We have a day on the Gulf Coast planned again (hopefully we’ll actually make it this year!). It goes without saying that we’ll be back to Discovery Cove for a day as the Reef Pool is one of the highlights of the holiday for Lauren and I. This year we’ll be in the newly constructed Grand Reef providing it’s finished in time.

Expect tons of photos in this years trip report again and we’ll try and throw in some video too for good measure.

So, in time honoured tradition now follows the rules of the trip.


WE WON’T……..

Deface perfectly good credit cards!



Pick our noses on the rides!



Pull the wings off Lovebugs! (this is how harmless they are if you wondered)



Stuff pizza crusts in our ketchup!



Feed Squirrels chips!



Wear our food, we'll eat it!





Mention "poo" all holiday, no matter how tempting it is!



Won't stop at every single water fountain!



Won't go in a mood!



Won't break this year's fans in under an hour!



Won't tell people where to shove it, even if it is tempting!



Won't let the girls navigate!

[wizzo]

Won't stand too close to horses!



and definitely won't eat Lucky Charms in the nude!



WE WILL……….

Listen to whatever Daddy tells us to do!



Eat our way through the Free Dining Plan



Be nice to eachother all holiday!



Go aaaaaaaaarrrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh at every opportunity!



Eat our own weight in Pineapple Floats!



Doubtless shop for England!



Pose Nicely for Dad's photos!



Come up for air once in a while!



Hopefully play golf again!



but most of all, we'll have as much fun as we always have in our favourite place on earth!





So expect regular updates as and when the planning progresses.

***Update 26/4/11***

The countdown calendars are back again this year and they've just been sellotaped to the kitchen units and the first day crossed off! Only 149 to go then!

I got a photo before the kids started doodling on them.



***Update 6/7/11***

So here we are in the dog days of summer waiting for our trip. We're trying to fill our time in as best we can.

So far we've taken the kids to London for a long weekend and let half of Jedward take a photo with them.


Yes that is M&S if you're wondering!

Oh and we've only gone and booked our next Florida trip! We've booked a villa for Easter 2012! Thanks to a fellow Dibber Coral for a lovely villa at a great price. More on that later as it's only been sorted in the last 24 hours.

This month we'll be paying our disney bill and then I suppose we'll have to finally decide what we are doing about park tickets! It's a dilemma again this trip.

***Update 7/8/11***

Just over a month to go and we've paid our Disney bill a couple of weeks ago and over the weekend I've booked our car. This year we're going for a 7 Seat Dodge Grand Caravan via Carhire3000. Once again they were cheaper than going direct with Dollar, Alamo etc and for us the cheapest of all the uk 3rd party rental companies.

Regular readers may remember we've always had the 8 seat offering from Toyota (Sienna) when there has been more than the four of us over the Dodge but as Arkwright would say "I didn't get where I am today by paying £150 extra for one more seat that we don't need! ". I'm sure the Dodge will be fine but I can't recommened the Sienna highly enough if you are ever offered one.

As I mentioned in the last update, we've already booked our next trip next Easter so with this is mind we've bought Universal tickets for grandparents but the four of us are going to buy annual passes on the gate at Universal when we arrive. Not only will this save us for this trip and Easter 2012 but to let you in on a little secret, we're hoping to be back September 2012 too so if we can sneak 3 trips into a calendar year the annual passes could save even more.

The intention is to put off going to Universal as long as we can on this holiday (second week). Then if we go the same time next year we'll do Universal in the first week of that holiday! Fingers crossed all the dates come together and we can REALLY get our money's worth out of those annual passes.

We've also booked Discovery Cove for the first Thursday this trip paying £123 for our choice of adventure dolphin swim tickets and £81 for our non swim tickets. Our "choice of adventure" being 14 days of Seaworld as we are saving Busch for our Easter trip.

We're going to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party on 27th September although we haven't bought tickets in advance this time as it;s not a date that will sell out and we can still get the advanced rate at the TTC when we get there. We're all really looking forward to it as it was a fantastic night last year and believe it or not even I'm going to say... it's worth the entrance fee!

Once again Lauren and I will be tormenting flipper and her Grandma will be joining us. I'd have gladly given it a miss and saved the £42 but Grandma isn't the strongest of swimmers and I'm sure she'll feel happier if I'm there to chaparone Lauren.

Lauren is beyond excited to be pulled along by a dolphin again. Maddy unfortunately is still too young at four

I've booked the car into the multi storey car park at T2 Manchester and we already had a bargain travelodge booked ages before we booked the holiday.

So we're more or less all set at this point. Just have to wait out the last 40 something days.

Just realised I hadn't mentioned ADR's. Although they don't need much mentioning as all Dibbers are experts now on the whole process. Being on the Free Dining Plan we've booked loads. Some old favourites and some new ones to us but you'll read all about them in a couple of months

We've even got a round of golf booked on Oak Trails course. Lauren is practising hard and going to her lessons weekly and hopefully she'll be able to do a few holes justice and most of all enjoy it. Since spring she's really taken to her golf with gusto and it all started with a lesson at Disney last year... and the bug bit!

I'm rambling now so I will conclude this update here. Not sure there will be another update. All depends on if we book something else or change our plans previous readers of my reports will know they are never set in stone!

PS. Will your spot Perry on our travels? or will it be Agent P?



***Update 16/8/11***

Click here for this latest update as I can't fit anymore photos on the original post

[Guest]

Ooh great, another trip report to look forward to. Even better, I've read your first two but somehow missed the third, so i get to read that in its entirety! Yay

[Guest]

Yay! Sorry for the pestering The picture of Maddy and Lauren together in their BBB hair is adorable!

At least you're better at pre-trip reports than me... I took 18 months to get mine done

[LauraC]

Yay - you're off again! Looking forward to reading more as the planning progresses.

I was surprised by the maths of staying at SSR too. I added it all up for us to compare onsite vs. offsite expecting there to be a massive difference. But, taking the free DDP into account it was actually really good value. And I didn't have to fluff the figures at all

[oh_darling]

Ooooh I'm so excited about this! Absolutely loved all your trippies, just re-read one last week so I'm fully up to date Wish you were going a bit later as I'd love to meet you all, we overlap by a couple days but won't be at SSR Looking forward to hearing more about your plans and of course I'm already keen for the trippie!

[oh_darling]

P.S you probably get this all the time, your daughters are gorgeous!

[mandy_mccormac]

looking forward to this one off to subscribe

[wizzo]

Originally Posted by oh_darling

P.S you probably get this all the time, your daughters are gorgeous!

See more...

Funnilly enough, we do hear it now and then! It's my genes I think

or maybe not!

[Derryfam]

Fantastic! Can't wait for updates! all subscribed ! We're there at the same time! I'm sure we won't bump into one another LOL