The "It's All About Disney" October 2013 Pre-Trip Report

[toots82]

OMG half an hour? That's brilliant, they'll be so surprised and no time to hang around and wait, perfect, you have to capture some pics or a video!

[WileyCoyote]

Always good to get the transport sorted ! LOL that is my OH's job as well so fair play he has sorted that out. So much better than driving back after a night flight
Look forward to more

[Guest]

Originally Posted by First Timer 12

Hi, really looking forward to reading your trip report. Shame about your ankle hopefully it will be a lot better by the time the holiday comes around! you have a lovely family & great plans for your holiday very well organised

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Thanks for reading The ankle's recently started showing signs of improvement, so fingers crossed!

Originally Posted by toots82

OMG half an hour? That's brilliant, they'll be so surprised and no time to hang around and wait, perfect, you have to capture some pics or a video!

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I know, it's going to be a whirlwind half an hour. Definitely need to capture it on camera. Can't actually believe it's still a secret.

Originally Posted by WileyCoyote

Always good to get the transport sorted ! LOL that is my OH's job as well so fair play he has sorted that out. So much better than driving back after a night flight
Look forward to more

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Thanks Amanda - we all fell asleep on the taxi journey home last time, so it's definitely worth the money in my view!

[Guest]

Morning all! A few minor updates to post today. Firstly, and most importantly, Nicola found this note hidden in Alex’s school bag this week and so we have confirmation that he still loves at least one of us, and not just football and the XBox!



Secondly, another £2K has been paid off the holiday balance. I hesitantly used the Virgin Holidays ‘manage my booking’ system again, but this time they only took the payment once, thankfully, else my bank manager might have phoned to cut ties with me forever!

Thirdly, I have my hands on our holiday dollars already. I’m not very good at playing the exchange rate waiting game and so as it’s been basically under 1.50 for most of the time I’ve been looking over the past few months, I bit the bullet when the Post Office started offering around 1.52 (which it still is, when I look today). I’m sure I could’ve got a better rate elsewhere, but we’re only taking $850 this time around so I don’t think it would have made a huge difference. The reason for only taking $850 is that last time we ended up bringing around $1,500 back with us, which is crazy (I think we started with about $3,500). Mostly that was because we over-budgeted for food, which we hardly spent anything on during our one week of DDP (although we did obviously spend quite a bit on grub when we moved to I-Drive and then Universal). This time we’ll have DDP for the entire 2 weeks, so I’ve decided to just take a bit of cash for general daily spends, mousekeeping, etc. and then put all the OOP meals, tips and drinks onto my Sainsbury’s credit card, which doesn’t charge for transactions in the US (I did use it a couple of times last year without any probs). Must remember to contact the credit card company before we go though, so that’s on the things-to-do list.

We did also take a trip to Poole last weekend (before the weather went to pot this week) to visit the shopping centre for some holiday clothes. Despite saying we didn’t need to get a lot as we spent a small fortune on clothes for last year’s trip, we still managed to put another significant dent in the bank balance. I’m planning a post at some point with pics of our shiny new clobber, so I won’t go into any more detail here. After shopping we headed over to Poole Park for a play and a nice walk around the estuary. We really love it down there (it’s about 40-60 minutes drive from where we live, depending on traffic).







We then made our way to Tower Park for a few games in the bowling centre and then we watched Epic in 3D, which the kids enjoyed (I thought it was “OK”). Finally, we had dinner in TGIs (this always reminds us of our time on I-Drive – I know it’s not for everyone, but we’re all TGI Friday fans).







We had a fun, but long, day – can’t wait to be able to write that about our time in Florida!

Hope you’re all having a good weekend, and thanks for reading.

PS. Happy Father’s Day to any dads online!

[WileyCoyote]

Looks like a fun time there and nice feeling to have paid off more of the hols.
LOL the boys gave Andy some Dollars for father's day today so he can go spending on more trainers no doubt ...
Hope the kids are spoiling you today !

[moosha]

How have I missed this? I obviously don't spend enough time on the Dibb (although I know DH would disagree with that)

I loved your last trippie, you have a lovely family and a lot of the things you guys enjoyed / didn't enjoy so much were the same as ours so I'm really looking forward to reading about this year's adventures. Especially as you're staying at Wilderness Lodge, where we're staying next year. We haven't even visited WL before, but love the look of it in photos and the Dibb / TA reviews are great. I'm reassured that you booked to stay at the hotel on the back of your visit there last year, it really does look lovely

Your plans sound great, I'm looking forward to hearing about the cruise as well as your time at Disney. Your list of restaurants looks stellar too - we really enjoyed our experience at Les Chefs de France (Remy was a big hit with our girls), and we had fab meals at Jiko (my favourite meal of the holibobs) and Kona (dinner)

How are you managing to keep it all a secret from Alex and Izzy? We have only had our trip booked a few weeks and I keep nearly spilling the beans We go in April and currently the plan is to tell the girls at Christmas, would love to save the surprise until the last minute but I just don't think I'll be able to keep my mouth shut until then. Can't wait to hear how your two react to the exciting news

[Lisa29]

I've missed two updates!

Good to hear you have the car sorted. I am not looking forward to being the second pair of eyes on our return journey with DH driving.

Yay for spending so much money! It makes me laugh how much we all get excited at paying off so much money towards our holidays.

Good idea to change your money. I am really tempted to do mine. I have done a few hundred over the last few weeks but think I should get as much done as I can. Can't imagine the exchange rate will go up that much to make a difference.

Great day out in Poole. I love TGI's too, we are hopefully going on Wednesday.

Can't wait to read more.

[Guest]

Originally Posted by WileyCoyote

Looks like a fun time there and nice feeling to have paid off more of the hols.
LOL the boys gave Andy some Dollars for father's day today so he can go spending on more trainers no doubt ...
Hope the kids are spoiling you today !

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Father's day was good, thanks, Nicola even got my fave pudding (jam roly poly!) which I had all to myself as she's still dieting and the kids don't like it!

Originally Posted by moosha

How have I missed this? I obviously don't spend enough time on the Dibb (although I know DH would disagree with that)

I loved your last trippie, you have a lovely family and a lot of the things you guys enjoyed / didn't enjoy so much were the same as ours so I'm really looking forward to reading about this year's adventures. Especially as you're staying at Wilderness Lodge, where we're staying next year. We haven't even visited WL before, but love the look of it in photos and the Dibb / TA reviews are great. I'm reassured that you booked to stay at the hotel on the back of your visit there last year, it really does look lovely

Your plans sound great, I'm looking forward to hearing about the cruise as well as your time at Disney. Your list of restaurants looks stellar too - we really enjoyed our experience at Les Chefs de France (Remy was a big hit with our girls), and we had fab meals at Jiko (my favourite meal of the holibobs) and Kona (dinner)

How are you managing to keep it all a secret from Alex and Izzy? We have only had our trip booked a few weeks and I keep nearly spilling the beans We go in April and currently the plan is to tell the girls at Christmas, would love to save the surprise until the last minute but I just don't think I'll be able to keep my mouth shut until then. Can't wait to hear how your two react to the exciting news

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Welcome along Michelle I'm really pleased you've booked to go back - I loved your a-m-a-z-i-n-g Florida/NYC trippie and I can see from your signature that a pre-trippie is underway so I'll be off to read that shortly I'll be sure to take lots if pics of the WL. Really looking forward to staying there - as you say, it seems to get very favourable reviews. Izzy is going to love the Bambi tiles in the bathroom!

Keeping things a secret hasn't been easy, but the kids are going to Devon with Nanny Lyn and Grandad Chris (and their cousins) in August so whenever either of us mess up and mention the holiday, and the kids pick up on it, we just say we're talking about their trip to Devon. Really hope we can last until October!

Originally Posted by Lisa29

I've missed two updates!

Good to hear you have the car sorted. I am not looking forward to being the second pair of eyes on our return journey with DH driving.

Yay for spending so much money! It makes me laugh how much we all get excited at paying off so much money towards our holidays.

Good idea to change your money. I am really tempted to do mine. I have done a few hundred over the last few weeks but think I should get as much done as I can. Can't imagine the exchange rate will go up that much to make a difference.

Great day out in Poole. I love TGI's too, we are hopefully going on Wednesday.

Can't wait to read more.

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Hi Lisa. Hope you had a good time at TGIs if you did manage to go? It is a bit odd getting excited about seeing all your hard earned savings disappearing towards Richard Branson's account, I definitely see your point! The exchange rate seems to have taken another little dip over the past couple of days, I've noticed, but not a lot. Having some dollars in my hand made me feel like it's actually not that far away now (only another 4 months hahaha).

[Lisa29]

Yes, we went yesterday, it was delicious as always. I really do like the sesame chicken strips appetiser!

I ordered some cash and TC's when Sainsbury's had their 'sale' on Tuesday which I will pick up tomorrow. Just wish I had done what I wanted with my Fairfx cards when it was $1.53 yesterday. Oh well, anything above $1.50 is a bonus and is the exchange rate I work on anyway.

[Guest]

Hello,

I'll be very interested to read your trip report as your holiday is identical to mine for next year (except for the cruise - I'm very jealous about that!)

We too are flying Virgin and staying at The Wilderness Lodge for the exact same two weeks in October 2014. We've cruised before, but not with Disney and I'm sure that you will absolutely love it!

I hope that your foot gets better soon.